


Bridezilla

by Gnom_DePlume



Category: Beetle Juice (1988)
Genre: Afterlife, Canon - Movie, Crack Treated Seriously, Eventual Smut, F/M, Original Character(s), Swearing, Unofficial Sequel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-02
Updated: 2016-03-06
Packaged: 2018-01-10 23:48:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 38,733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1166076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gnom_DePlume/pseuds/Gnom_DePlume
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was time they got hitched...come hell or high Neitherworld antics!  Movieverse sequel</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In Which His Bride Summons Our Hero, Beetlejuice

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to Beetlejuice, nor am I affiliated with any organization that does.
> 
> Originally posted on ff.net beginning in 2009. The original author notes will not be appearing here unless they have relevant chapter warnings. Before being posted here, the text is undergoing a pretty serious edit (for some reason I really love run-on sentences and em-dashes) and a revamp. The smutty stuff will not be excised (unlike on ff.net), unless it's funnier that way. (Also I really like parentheses, fyi.)
> 
> This began as total crack, but somewhere along the way it morphed into a story with a real plot line and character development. That wasn't as much fun to write, so it's still a work in progress five years after I started it...
> 
> But I do know how it ends!

Lydia Deetz dropped the last box and flopped onto the flimsy plastic chair to survey her new dorm. It had barely enough room for some furniture and an incongruous sink crammed in over to the side. Everything from the exposed pipes to the metal door was painted a dingy off-white. 

Depressing -- more so than her usual non-color scheme of black. Still, it was her own space which she wouldn’t have to share with a roommate, or better yet, with Delia’s fashion sense.

She hadn’t really wanted to leave. When she had proposed the idea of commuting to a nearby community college, her frequently out-of-town parents had raised an eyebrow, but it was Adam and Barbara who had sat her down for a rather familiar talk about the living needing to live.

“Oh, Lydia,” Barbara began. “You can’t stay here forever. You need to get out and live your life while you still have one. We love you, and we want what’s best for you, even if we won’t get to see you everyday anymore.”

“Listen to her on this, we know what we’re talking about,” Adam added.

“It was a happy accident that brought you into our unlife, and we’ve been glad to have you for as long as we have. It seems like we just turned around one day and here you are, all grown up and ready to stand on your own.”

Adam went on with a metaphor about birds leaving the nest and learning to fly, which went on for an unbearable length of time and is just something that parents, even surrogate ones, only say to make themselves feel better. Fortunately for Lydia, she wasn’t paying much attention. Something that Barbara had said niggled at the back of her mind, where she kept things she didn’t want to think about too much.

It wasn’t an accident that the Maitlands were still around. No, she really owed four years and counting with the most dedicated parental units she’d ever had to…HIM. A certain ghost with the most whom she realized with a sinking feeling that she had utterly stiffed (to pardon the pun). It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair. They’d had a deal, which he had upheld, and she had let him get eaten by a sandworm at the altar. Not cool. 

Sure, she didn’t want to marry a rude, perverted, dirty ghost who transformed into snakes and trick carnival rides, but she had said that she would. No one could say that Lydia Deetz went back on her word – except for HIM.

Hindsight was a bitch, and it wouldn't leave her alone. At times, Lydia wondered if he had even survived the sandworm, and was rather disgusted with herself at the sense of relief she felt at the thought that he hadn’t. However, Lydia wasn’t stupid enough to try calling him without a plan for any contingency.

So she got into a good university, packed her room, and asked to borrow the handbooks. The Maitlands would never agree to what she was planning, so she told them she wanted to see if there was a way that she could communicate with them while she was away. Her ghostly godparents weren’t any good with using the phone. All they could manage was a sort of Morse code made of static. What she was actually looking up was both exactly that and something a little more complicated.

She found that mirrors could be a conduit for the soul, allowing the dead to travel or scry, but that didn’t help her much and was illegal besides (too many spirits had gotten themselves inconveniently trapped inside, unable to get out and very much visible to the living). The living could try to contact the dead using things like Ouija boards, but it was terribly imprecise and you never knew who you were really channeling.

The only mention she found of the dead marrying the living was in the fine print of a footnote and it basically said: Don’t. 

So she looked up contracts and renegotiations, which there was an entire chapter on that basically said: Your word is your bond, get used to it.

Nearly at her wit’s end by the time she was having a nice farewell dinner out with her parents, she was saved by, of all things, a bit of salacious gossip about Otho’s divorce. He was losing half his assets because of the prenup. All she had to do was get HIM to sign a prenuptial agreement and she could soothe her conscience and her common sense! How hard could it be?

Famous last words.

Finally, though, it was written. And then re-written, to be as baffling and incomprehensible and full of jargon as possible. Her father was some help in this, as he was a rather unscrupulous real estate agent. What’s more he never asked what she needed the phrases for beyond a vague reply of ‘practice for school.’ She knew that her father cared about her, but sometimes it was hard to believe it. If she had told him what she was planning, though, that would get a reaction. He would freak!

If she thought too much about what her parents wanted, she just might chicken out. They wanted her to leave the nest? She was going to take a flying leap. The moment of truth was upon her. Now she would find out what had happened to...HIM.

She opened the box marked with a poison face and took out her wedding dress. It was actually a Halloween costume she had worn last year when she went as a zombie bride, but she hardly thought he would care about a little fake blood. Okay, a lot of fake blood and a gory chest wound, which she was quite proud of making herself. The dress itself was from a second hand store and terribly ‘80s, with excessive lace and poufy sleeves. 

The dress was old, her shoes were new. They were also blue. She dropped a penny in the toe and put them on. Barbara had let Lydia borrow her own veil for the costume, with a strict injunction to take care of it. She smoothed down her hair and settled the veil, hiding her face under a layer of tulle, because it’s bad luck if the groom sees the bride before the wedding and she needed all the luck she could get.

Then she laid the final draft of the prenup (printed in a small, hard to read calligraphic font) out with a pen, her purple bouquet, and a boutonniere. 

Lastly, she took up the ring he’d managed to slip on her finger and said, “Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice!”

She had a Plan.

\--SCENE BREAK--

The Waiting Room was really goddamn boring.

Hardly anything changed, especially after his head had unshrunk.

It could have been five minutes, it could have been five centuries, but his queue number was next! Fan-fucking-tastic. Time for another ‘interview’ with Juno. He loved her to bits, seriously, cross his unbeating heart, but she was a rulebook thumping harridan. But he’d got her good this time! It was all done legit – his little Lyds had agreed to marry him fair and square, and he was off to complete that ceremony and get his green card just as soon as Juno was finished yelling at him. Maybe before she even started! And, hey, maybe she would give them her blessing! He snorted, and greedily watched as the sign ticked over that last, beautiful digit.

That’s when he felt the summons.

“Shiiiiiii-” The waiting room blurred into a mess of beige. “-iiit.” He had to blink and rub his eyes to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating a featureless room with a bunch of boxes haphazardly stacked everywhere. He started to turn around and noticed he’d materialized with his foot in a box. “Shit.” Well, at least he was making a bad impression on an empty room….

“Beetle-“ ventured a querying voice.

“Ah-ah-ah! No B words!” He whirled around, surreptitiously trying to shake his foot free, but forgetting to make it incorporeal the first couple of times.

Then he noticed the whole veil, wedding dress, gaping hole ensemble and blanched a little greener. “Whoa.” Broads killed on their wedding day were touchy with a capital T. Think a living bridezilla is bad? Just wait until you’ve met one that had all her hard work and dreams and planning thwarted on the very cusp of the fulfillment of the Most Important Day of Her Life.

“So, uh…” He checked her ring finger. Bare. Fuckfuckfuck. He managed a half-hearted grin. “Shotgun wedding?” He winced as she took a shocked step back. Probably he shouldn’t have mentioned the wound. He prayed she was in a weepy mood and not an angry-tear-your-balls-off mood but he couldn’t tell with that veil in the way. 

And then, finally, he noticed the other hand holding up a ring. His ring.

“You don’t remember me?” she said. 

“…Lydia?!” For about a microsecond he was stupefied. Then in an instant he was crushing her in his arms. “Babes, I can’t leave you alone for a minute! How could this happen?!” He melodramatically raised his face to the heavens and shouted something about cruel fates and lives being snuffed out in their prime, at which he suddenly held her out at arm’s length and, squinting through the veil, asked, “You are still hot under there, right?” And then his gaze traveled down. “You grew up real niiice,” he leered.

Lydia was mostly ignoring his dramatics, as she was shocked and upset that she had spent so much time thinking about him when he barely recognized her. How many living girls had he tried to con into marrying him, anyway?! At least the bastard hadn’t forgotten her name!

Then he had his hand on her ass and she was pushing at it and trying to squirm away when a change came over him. He went dead still and grabbed the hand about to slap him.

“Hey,” he growled indignantly. “Just who were you trying to get hitched to?! You were affianced to me!” he said, affecting a snotty accent.

“Who…what the hell are you talking about? I’m trying to marry you! What do you mean, ‘were’? Are you trying to tell me you don’t want me anymore?” She shoved at his shoulder with her free hand. She had a fleeting thought that she should be glad if he called the whole thing off, but still! It was insulting. As if he could really do better. Hell, she was the one marrying down! Way down. As in, six feet under.

He disengaged and started nervously adjusting the collar of his sandy maroon tux. “Well, uh…No. There’s not much point anymore, after all.” He grinned. “But we can still be really good friends…” He trailed off with a shiver as the atmosphere of the room dropped ten degrees, and it’s damn hard to make a ghost who‘s normally causing the cold spots shiver. 

Lydia threw the veil back, her brown eyes burning with a black fury. “Not much point! Did you not come back because you found someone else?!” She felt like kicking herself (or better yet, him) for thinking that this jerk cared at all about his deal with her. He’d probably been schmoozing nubile young marriageable women this whole damn time instead of suffering in the belly of a sand worm. “And after you blackmailed me into agreeing to marry you and dragged me to the altar and stole my voice and the Maitlands-!”

He interjected quickly there, trying to avoid the castration he sensed in the immediate future. “I saved them, just like I said I would!” He pointed this out with both index fingers.

When she tried to continue ranting, he resorted to drastic measures. Distracting her by grabbing her around the waist (hey, who said drastic measures couldn’t also be fun?) and pulling her close, he went on as sincerely as he could manage. “Babes, babes! You’re twisting everything around! I didn’t mean 'no' as in I don’t want to marry you, I meant 'no' as in I don’t not want to marry you! There’s nobody else.” 

Having used up his quota of ‘truthful’ eye contact for at least a decade, he stuffed her head on his shoulder. Amidst the ensuing puff of yellow sand, he absently fingered her long black hair while wondering when she let it grow out. He would have recognized her the second he saw her old wild updo. He noted that she was now only a few inches shorter than him. He might have to stop slouching. Ha, yeah right.

He also noticed she was still breathing as every inhalation brushed her breasts over his chest, but he didn’t think (with the head above the belt) much about it. Most ghosts took a century or so to kick the deeply ingrained habit. And hey, if she kept that up, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad being leg-shackled to a ghost. She obviously had a haunting gig out here, they were in some sort of attic closet judging by all the boxes, and she could still let him Out even if it wasn’t permanent. Besides, what sort of heartless administration types would deny a husband visitation rights?  
…All of them. Well, he could dream.

Lydia was in a bit of a quandary. Now that she had convinced him he really did want to marry her after all, how did she go about telling him that if he wanted to get the hell out of her life forever that would just be peachy with a side of keen? 

Meanwhile, he was touching her again. And it was high time that he stopped. The Saturnine sand was not only making her eyes water and her nose itch, it reeked of what she assumed was sandworm because it wasn’t like anything she remembered of eau de Beetlejuice (heavy on the ew). But even damp cellar smell was better than this. She grimaced, but she was afraid that if she opened her mouth to yell she might find out what sandwormy sand tasted like. “Mmmmrph!”

When she tried squeezing her arms in between them to push him away, he only pulled her in closer, trapping her in an awkward T-rex pose. Scrabbling at the ruffles on his tux and wiggling informed her that, yes, he was very solid, and that, no, she wasn’t going anywhere. In fact, he was remarkably solid for a ghost. Adam and Barbara had always seemed to be barely there, like they were made of heavy air and if she just pushed she could walk right through them.

Well, at least he wasn’t groping her. The hand on her head was actually kind of nice. She couldn’t remember the last time somebody had played with her hair.

And then an ill-timed wiggle brought her hips in contact with his, and he was…was…and then he ground into her, cackling. A flare of white hot mortification shot up her spine and she stomped on his foot, getting in an elbow to the solar plexus.

He yelped and jumped back. “What was that for?!”

She glared at him, her cheeks uncharacteristically red and her fists clenched. “You reek like sandworms, for one thing!”

He looked nonplussed for a moment. “I do?” He sniffed his armpit thoughtfully, which made him gag and go 'eurgh' with his alarmingly long, striped tongue sticking out. “You know, you’re right. And when you’re right, you’re right.” He made a show of brushing himself off, and then he was wearing a striped suit. The yellow sand and unfortunate smell that accompanied it were gone, leaving behind only his own patina of dirt and mold. “But that’s what happens when you get eaten by a sandworm – you know I hate ‘em. But now that that’s taken care of,” he dusted his hands off, “C’mere and gimme a kiss!” He opened his arms wide and advanced on her, grinning maniacally.

Lydia dodged desperately around a stack of boxes. Maybe if she kept him talking…? “If you hate it so much, then why didn’t you poof it away before?”

“I can’t do shit in the Waiting Room, it’s a curse, really. And that’s juice, babes, not ‘poof’” he said, trying to look innocent while inching closer. 

“I’m not some effeminate nancy boy ghost, y’know?”

“No,” Lydia said while backing away, “I don’t know.”

“Well, why don’t you come over here and I’ll show ya, then!” He waggled his eyebrows.

“No, I don’t think so,” she said, shaking her head.

“Aw, c’mon Lyds! Whassamatter? We’re gonna get hitched!”

She blinked and he was latching onto her from behind. “Ack!” she shrieked, nearly leaped out of her skin as he licked her ear. Then she broke his grip with an evil kick to the knee and rounded on him when he let go. “We need to lay down some ground rules, first! So just sit down or something and behave!” She pointed at the chair on the other side of the room.

Frowning sulkily, he just floated up in the air and lounged. “I don’t know what your problem is. You called me, you wanted me, and now you’re acting all virginal.” He blinked at her fierce blush. “You are!” He rolled over and propped his chin on his fist, chortling and leering. “Don’ worry ‘bout it, babes. I can make it good for you. I’ve had lots of practice.”

“That right there is what I’m worried about!” She crossed her arms. “You’re a…a man whore!”

He spluttered at this, mouthing denials.

“I’m not going to stand for you hitting on anything with a uterus,” she went on. Figuring this was as good an opening as any, she went to the desk and offered him her carefully prepared prenup. 

He took it as if it was going to blow up, and raised one wickedly angled eyebrow. “What the hell’s this?”

“Our new prenuptial agreement.”

He didn’t like the sound of that. He especially didn’t like the smug little smile on her face as she said it. He pulled out a thick pair of glasses from his front pocket and glanced over the closely printed, nearly illegible script with the eyes of a man who had spent centuries reading Neitherworld paperwork as Juno’s assistant. Lydia was a sly little minx, he had to give her that. It was pretty tight legalese -- only she had wasted most of it on certain laughable ‘restrictions.’ It wouldn’t be that hard to get her to beg him to touch her (tch, virgins); he hadn’t really been planning a big exposé to reveal the truth of the afterlife; and he didn’t much like killing people because then he had to deal with their ghosts bitching at him afterwards (ghosts were a lot harder to shut up than breathers). She hadn’t even thought to put down ‘No juicing me into a gag if you get annoyed with my yammering.’

No, what he had a problem with was the cheating clause. Eternity was an awfully long time to be stuck with a jealous shrew. Yeah, sure, the sanctity of marriage, right, but what was the harm in a little ogle or a pinch here and there? It wasn’t like he’d actually do anything, he’d still be coming home to her at night, wouldn’t he? Besides, you’d think she’d know that marriages in the afterlife already had safeguards, part of the whole ‘soul binding’ thing (of course you could opt for a ceremony that didn’t, heh). This was seriously overkill.

He eyed the bloody hole in her stomach and wondered if she had a complex about infidelity because her old groom-to-be shot her for another woman. As he raised his gaze to hers, he knew instinctively that asking would set off the angry tempest brewing in her womanly bosom. His gaze slid back down. She had really great knockers. Hell, that guy must've been an idiot. No, no! He tore his gaze away. No set of boobs was great enough to offset the nagging of a wife who imagined adultery in everything he did. 

Maybe she just needed a little time and reassurance to get over her death. Yeah, he could ‘reassure’ her all night long…but first to take care of this pesky little detail.

He folded up the prenup, then stuck it and the glasses in his pocket. Two could play at this game. He put on his ‘Juilliard’ face. “I shall have my lawyer take a look at this and get the amended version right back to you. See ya.” He made as if to leave.

“Wait a minute!” She grabbed his sleeve. This was not the Plan. He was supposed to just sign it and marry her on the spot then go away, not take it to someone who would explain it!

He turned around. “Yeeeeeees?”

“We’re not…going to have the ceremony now?” she asked.

“Gee, babes, in a hurry? Can’t wait to get your hands on me, eh?” He stuffed his hands in his pockets, smiling.

“Last time you couldn’t get it over with fast enough!” she said, frowning.

He scowled thunderously. “Last time, your friends the Maitlands were hell bent on breaking us up! Wouldn’t know compatibility if it bit ‘em in the ass!” He leaned against a patch of air and crossed his ankles, going on in a more normal tone, “We’re not going to invite them this time, are we? I mean, there’s a right way to crash a party and then there’s the fucking wrong sandworm way, right?”

She was suddenly struck with a sobering thought. “You’re not going to...do anything to them, are you?” She remembered in vivid detail a gigantic snake and a carnival hat.

He looked surprised, as if the thought hadn’t occurred to him. And, honestly, it hadn’t. He was done with the Maitlands, that was the past, they weren't here and he didn’t care what happened to them now. Of course, he wouldn’t say no to playing a few ‘pranks’ if somebody stuck those yuppies in the same room with him…. “No,” he said, pretending to have to think about it. “Should I?”

“No!”

“Hey, babes, you gonna let go of my arm sometime soon? I got things to do.” He looked pointedly at her hand, secretly gleeful that she was touching him instead of the other way around. Soon it would be more than just his arm!

She let go like he was on fire and then stared at her hand like it had betrayed her. “What things?” she asked suspiciously.

“I need to go see my lawyer about this ‘prenuptial agreement’ of yours. I said that already. Were ya too busy staring at my perfect good looks to listen to me? Ya need to learn to multitask, like me,” he said while staring at her mouth. It was such a perfect little red cupid’s bow. He really wanted to find out if it was lipstick. Not that it mattered if it was or not. Maybe she was born with it, maybe it’s make-up, but now that she’s dead it’s permanent.

Oh, no. She was not going to just let him Out, on the loose and fancy free. Who knew if he’d even come back? If he wanted to leave, she had to put him Back. “You need to go?" she said. "Ok, then. Beet-!”

He cut her off, waving his arms in an X. “Ah! No need for that! I can get there fine by myself. Quick as a wink, back in a jiffy, you get the picture!”

“I can’t just leave you Out,” she said firmly. “Juno would keep me on her desk in a jar. She probably won’t be too happy about this as it is.”

“So Juno’s your caseworker?” He snorted, shaking his head. “Tsk tsk, summoning a poltergeist,” he said in a terrible impersonation of Juno, using her voice but not her mannerisms.

A laugh escaped Lydia’s mouth before she could prevent it, although she was looking at him like he was crazy. Well, crazier than usual. Her caseworker? Why would she have a caseworker? Because she made a deal with Beetlejuice? Something was off about this situation. If he still needed to marry a living woman, why wasn’t he hauling her off to the reverend right now? A living woman…he thought she was dead! A deep belly laugh burst out, as she touched her ‘ghastly wound,’ but she managed to stop before she gave the game away. God! This was priceless.

“Y’know, if you just wanted to skip this whole ‘prenup’ thing....” He glanced over at her.

She frowned sternly. “No prenup, no wedding.”

“And the only way I’m leaving without the B-words is…?”

“If we get married.”

They both stood there for a moment considering that.

“You didn’t even bring witnesses.”

“Damn! I knew I was forgetting something!”

\--SCENE BREAK--

And in her office, where she had been scrying on the proceedings with a piece of glass (much less obtrusive than a mirror) ever since Beetlejuice had disappeared from the Waiting Room, was Juno. And she may have looked judgmental on the outside for appearance’s sake, but inside she was laughing her ass off.


	2. In Which Our Hero and His Bride Visit a Lawyer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lydia and Beetlejuice set off for the Neitherworld to resolve their little difference of opinion over prenuptial agreements.

PREVIOUSLY:

A living woman…he thought she was dead! A deep belly laugh burst out, as she touched her ‘ghastly wound,’ but she managed to stop before she gave the game away. God! This was priceless.

“Y’know, if you just wanted to skip this whole ‘prenup’ thing....” He glanced over at her.

She frowned sternly. “No prenup, no wedding.”

“And the only way I’m leaving without the B-words is…?”

“If we get married.”

They both stood there for a moment considering that.

“You didn’t even bring witnesses.”

“Damn! I knew I was forgetting something!”

AND NOW, ON WITH THE STORY!

 

CHAPTER TWO: In Which Our Hero and His Bride Visit a Lawyer

 

Lydia glared at Beetlejuice.

Beetlejuice leered at Lydia.

Finally, he said, “Well, isn’t this here just a gen-u-wine Mexican standoff!” Suddenly they were both wearing ridiculously large cowboy hats and pointing old-fashioned pistols at each other’s heads. 

He pulled the trigger and she shrieked, ducking and covering. He was insane! And he thought she was a ghost already! She was too young to die! She’d never learned to parasail!

He was laughing hysterically.

She cautiously peeked, then patted herself down to find no holes, other than the obvious. A stupid ‘BANG!’ sign was sticking out of the barrel of his gun. “You BASTARD,” she hissed. That was just about enough of this! She advanced on him, intent to maim. She wasn’t fifteen anymore, letting herself be terrorized by amateur theatrics!

He hurriedly sent the guns away. “Now, babes…let’s be reasonable here.” Seeming to notice anew the gory wound painted on her stomach, he completely misconstrued everything. Backing away right through the boxes, he said “I know it must be a sensitive subject, but you need to learn how to take a joke!”

“Oh, yeah?” She poked him in the chest, encountering nothing but air. “How’s this for a joke? Knock! Knock!” She leaned back out of his odoriferous personal space and crossed her arms.

At length he answered, fiddling with his cuffs. “Who’s there?”

“Beetle.” Her voice could have cut glass. (Elsewhere, Juno was cursing at her newly broken scrying window.)

“Beetle who?” The corners of his mouth optimistically began turning up while the rest of his face, more in tune with reality, frowned.

“Beetlejuice! Beetlejuice! B-”

Then his tongue was in her mouth, jamming up the last word. So she bit it. He made a muffled sound of pain, but impossibly, the tip of his tongue stretched out and wound around hers. All warmth fled before its icy stroke and she nearly had a heart attack because it wasn’t bad. There was a complete lack of horrible going on. Her jaw creaked open. In fact, it was sort of…mmm.  
When he withdrew, she nearly followed him back, her arms twining around his neck. Then her fingertips encountered something strangely soft and fuzzy growing on his skin. And she remembered that it was mold. Because he was dead. And that was…bad?

Then the hand creeping below her waist squeezed, and reality rushed back into the world. She remembered that she was very angry at him. He must have seen the thundercloud gathering on her face because he set her upright (when had he dipped her?) and said, “Why don’t ya just come with me, Lyds?”

“Is that even possible?” Caught off guard by the idea of finally going to the Neitherworld, she still swatted at his errant hand.

“’Course, babes.” It would break a couple dozen rules about the mandatory haunting gig, but what’s a coupla rules to him? “Ghost with the most, here.” And what she didn’t know, wouldn’t hurt him. “But you gotta stand real close.”

At this, she looked doubtful. “Why?” she asked.

“Oh, y’know, inter-dimensional vortex mechanics, wormhole creation…it’s tricky business. Ya don’t want to leave pieces behind, do ya?”

She stepped back into the circle of his arms. What could it hurt? If he couldn’t actually take her along, he’d still be gone and she would say the words to make sure. She had tried to finish their deal and he'd said no, right? But if he could take her along, she’d finally get to see the Neitherworld that she’d been told so much about. She could just stage an enormous disagreement over the prenup with the lawyer until Beetlejuice gave up (again) on marrying her. Either way, she’d be happy and her conscience would be clear. And, well, if it was breaking a few rules…she didn’t want to know. Plausible deniability.

“A little closer,” he said. At her penetrating look, he pointedly put his hands behind his back. “You want to lose an arm and a leg?”

“Hm.” There was about a foot of space between them. She shuffled in a half-step.

“Cloooooser.” He tried not to grin. Too much, anyway.

She inched in a hairsbreadth away, bravely ignoring the dank cellar smell. It wasn’t actually that bad when you got used to it. Even the lingering hint of burnt tobacco was bearable. Not that she wanted to hang around him long enough to get used to it.

“Now,” he rumbled in her ear, “ya need to hold on to me.”

Tentatively, she placed her palms on his back, hugging him loosely.

“I don’t know, that’s maybe not enough. If you want to keep all your toes, you should put your leg around me, too.” He raised a wicked eyebrow speculatively.

Deadpan, she said, “I’m going to take my chances.”

He shrugged. “Suit yourself.” Then he opened the locked dormitory door behind him, which opened not on the unfamiliar hallway it was supposed to, but an unfamiliar office, wood paneled and lined with books. Scooping her up in a bear hug and crushing her to his beer belly, he stepped through and kicked the door shut. “Here we are!”

Her hands clenched around his suit jacket so fiercely it was a miracle it didn’t rip. “Buh! Guh! Yuh!” she spluttered in rage. She pounded on his shoulder. “You…you sneaky bastard! Put me down right now!” He dropped her. She stumbled and fell on her backside, where she proceeded to kick his ankle with her pointy blue high heels.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE, BEETLEJUICE,” said a computerized voice from the desk.

Turning and holding out his hands, Beetlejuice said, “My ole pal, my bestest buddy, my one and only court-appointed lawyer!” He lunged across the desk to embrace the lawyer, lifting him out of his seat. Then he abruptly let go and yanked Lydia to her feet while she was still struggling with the tangled train of her wedding dress. “I’d like ya to meet my lovely fiancée, Lydia…” He pursed his lips in thought. “D? T…something?”

Gritting her teeth and digging her nails into his elbow where he’d tucked her arm around his, she ground out, “Deetz.” She would have added some other, very uncomplimentary names for Beetlejuice, but she was reluctant to make more of a scene in front of a stranger.

The lawyer was an old-fashioned gentleman, wearing something vaguely 18th century under the voluminous black court robe. The long, curled grey wig of the uniform was jammed on top of another, white wig which reminded her of George Washington. The most disturbing thing about him was how blue his classic face was, with his cravat askew and pulled so tight she’d be amazed if he could breathe…oh. Right.

“Babes, this is Mr. Jacob Newton.” He mockingly enunciated each syllable very carefully. “And he don’t appreciate nicknames.”

Mr. Newton started typing at a clunky machine sitting to one side on his desk. A second later the monotone voice issued forth. “MY CONDOLENCES, MISS DEETZ.”

“Thanks,” she said wryly. “It’s nice to meet you, too.” Silence stretched on uncomfortably as the lawyer frowned disapprovingly, Beetlejuice beamed, and Lydia wondered how to escape. “Um…Are…?”

Before she could finish, he typed, “NO RELATION.”

She stared. “What?”

“TO SIR ISAAC NEWTON. THAT IS WHAT YOU WERE GOING TO ASK.” He looked a bit taken aback.

“Who?”

“Guy who invented gravity, babes.” Beetlejuice chortled. “What are they teaching you in school nowadays, geeze!”

“HE DID NOT INVENT GRAVITY. HE MERELY GOT HIT ON THE HEAD WITH AN APPLE. ANYONE COULD HAVE DONE IT.”

Beetlejuice made a show of covering his mouth and whispering loudly to her out of the corner of his mouth, “It’s a sensitive subject. You should probably drop it.”

Newton made a choked noise. “IF I COULD SIGH, I WOULD. WHY ARE YOU HERE, BEETLEJUICE?”

“Can you knock it off with the B-words?”

“WHY ARE YOU HERE, BEETLEJUICE?”

Lydia didn’t know exactly what she expected to happen when a speech synthesizer said the name three times, but apparently it was nothing much. The tableau was this: Beetlejuice, disgruntled and tapping his fingers on the desk while holding her arm with a death grip; Newton, calmly sitting with perfect posture and just barely not smiling smugly.

Lydia could sigh, so she did -- while rolling her eyes. Plucking her contract out of Beetlejuice’s suit pocket using just her index finger and thumb so as to avoid touching anything icky, like his suit jacket, she dropped it on the desk. “He wants you to go over our prenuptial agreement.”

“MY AREA OF EXPERTISE IS CRIMINAL JUSTICE, BUT IF THIS IS WHAT IT TAKES TO MAKE HIM LEAVE….” Newton gingerly picked up the paper and unfolded it, scanning the contents.

Beetlejuice was looking at her with a mix of suspicion and mild awe. “How did you find it? You didn’t even pull out a single fucking spider with it.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” She raised a sardonic eyebrow. “I saw you put it there.”

“That don’t mean nothin’, babes.” He lugged a mangled tuba out of his front pocket. A mutant snake rooster which had been nesting in the horn hissed at him. “Whoah. You’d think I’d remember putting something like that in my pocket….” He stuffed the creature back in, the fabric wriggling and bulging for a moment before it lay flat again, but he studied the tuba. “Why the hell do I have this?” He chucked it over his shoulder, where it disappeared.

“MISS DEETZ, PLEASE FEEL FREE TO SIT DOWN.”

“Thanks, don’t mind if I do!” Beetlejuice said, plopping down on one elegant chair and turning it into a chintzy love seat. He patted the cushion next to him. “Room for two, babes….”

She eyed the ratty holes in the upholstery, the escaping springs, and his leer, then decided to sit on the other chair. It turned out that he’d had the right idea, as it was like sitting on her grandmother’s stuffy, horse-hair-stuffed antiques. No give at all. She might as well be sitting on an attractively carved rock. She shifted discretely, trying to get comfortable, and he snickered at her.

Mr. Newton finally looked up from the prenup. 

She nervously awaited his pronouncement, wondering if the contents of the contract would make Beetlejuice mad enough to just break it off right then and there.

“YOU MAY NOT KNOW THIS, YOUNG LADY, BUT MOST NEITHERWORLDERS PUT THESE KINDS OF AGREEMENTS DIRECTLY INTO THEIR WEDDING VOWS. IS THERE A SPECIFIC REASON WHY YOU WANT TO HAVE A SEPARATE CONTRACT?”

She blinked. “No. I mean, I didn’t know. I guess there isn’t.” She shot a glare over at Beetlejuice. She reflected on their failed wedding of four years ago, in which there had been no promises at all, not even having and holding, in sickness and in health. Even if he was in a hurry, she doubted it was just because it made the ceremony shorter! “Someone neglected to tell me that.” 

The someone in question shrugged, saying, “Not my fault you never asked.”

“I SUGGEST YOU VISIT A MARRIAGE COUNSELOR.” At her puzzled look, he added, “WHILE ANYONE NEEDS COUNSELING AFTER SPENDING ANY AMOUNT OF TIME WITH BEETLEJUICE-”

A tick developing from conditioned response to hearing his name, Beetlejuice grumped, “Not everyone.” At her incredulous look, he flicked his tongue at her.

“Counseling is sounding better and better,” she muttered.

Giving them both a quieting frown, Newton continued typing. “MARRIAGE COUNSELORS ALSO AID IN PICKING OUT CEREMONIES AND VOWS.”

“Well!” Beetlejuice jumped up, making a show of straightening his lapel. “Since ya can’t help us out.” He grabbed her hand. She got up and followed him rather than have it pulled off as he strode to the door. “Me and my Lyds are off to see these Ma-rage Con-seller people. Thanks for nothin’, Newt!” he called back.

The door was slamming behind them before Mr. Newton could type a reply. Picking up the contract left behind on his desk, he read the penalty clause again and made the strangled noise that passed for chuckling for him. He tucked the paper safely away so he could take it out and read it whenever he had to deal with that damn poltergeist again.

A bit surprised when the door opened onto a waiting room, Lydia didn’t protest as Beetlejuice hustled her out of the office and past the secretary’s desk. She knew it wasn’t the Waiting Room, based on descriptions given by the Maitlands. For one thing, it was also wood-paneled and antiqued. For another, the secretary could not be mistaken for Miss Argentina even by a very drunk, blind, deaf person. Even in Braille the difference would be astounding. He was seven feet tall, covered in stitching, and had bolts in his neck. He grumbled at them.

Beetlejuice sing-songed, “Hi, Frankie. Bye, Frankie.” 

And then they were out another door into a linoleum-tiled corridor the likes of which are seen in institutions the world over and even under, where Beetlejuice finally slowed to a saunter. Catching her breath, Lydia wondered why it felt like she was still forgetting something.


	3. In Which There Is a Very Long Corridor

PREVIOUSLY:

The door was slamming behind them before Mr. Newton could type a reply. Picking up the contract left behind on his desk, he read the penalty clause again and made the strangled noise that passed for chuckling for him. He tucked the paper safely away so he could take it out and read it whenever he had to deal with that damn poltergeist again.

-SCENE BREAK-

And then they were out another door into a linoleum-tiled corridor the likes of which are seen in institutions the world over and even under, where Beetlejuice finally slowed to a saunter. Catching her breath, Lydia wondered why it felt like she was still forgetting something.

AND NOW, ON WITH THE STORY!

 

CHAPTER THREE: In Which There Is a Very Long Corridor

 

As they strolled along, he started whistling and swinging their conjoined hands back and forth. Maybe that was what she had momentarily forgotten? She contemplated trying to break his clammy clasp, but decided it wasn’t worth the bother. Soap was invented for a reason. It was just her hand, after all.

After five minutes of walking down the never-ending corridor of endless doors of all descriptions, the whistling had gone from ‘passable’ to ‘irritating’ and she was heartily regretting her decision. 

“Why aren’t we there yet?”

He stopped whistling. “Huh? You say somethin’?”

She silently thanked whatever powers might control Beetlejuice for the end of ‘The Song That Never Ends.’ “I mean," she said, "why are we walking there?”

“I didn’t think you had the hang of floating yet, babes. But, hell, if you insist!” His next step was taken into the air, the next was faster, then he was taking a running leap and they were zooming down the corridor. A scream caught in her throat, she was dangling by the one hand with her dress flapping behind like a banner. His grin grew to insane proportions in a parody of g-force, while she barely caught her veil as it flew off.

“This isn’t what I meant, either!” she eventually managed to wheeze out.

“Whaaaaat?” he shouted back. “I can’t hear ya!”

She took as deep a breath as she could and belted, “Just stop for a minute, will you?” They whipped past some innocent bystanders, scattering paperwork and leaving wind-tunnel hair in their wake.

“Louder! I still can’t hear ya!”

“STOOOOOOOOOOOP!” She collided with his stock-still form blocking the corridor, which sent them both crashing to the linoleum. “Oof!” 

A few of the doors were opening and curious heads were peeking out, but when they saw who was out there they quickly retreated. Then locked their doors.

He was smirking at her. “Y’know, ya want a piece of me all ya gotta do is ask.” He ran his hands over her thighs where she was straddling him, bunching up her skirt as he went.

She huffed and struggled to her feet, and if she accidentally-on-purpose stomped on him on the way up, well…he deserved it.

“Argh!”

She pulled her zombie bridal gown straight and smoothed it down, inwardly approving of the wear and tear that was beginning to make it look really authentic. Although, it was apparently good enough to fool a certain ghost with the most in the first place. Odd as that was, if it gave her the opportunity to lay down a few stipulations in their marriage vows, she wasn’t complaining. If it got her out of marrying him at all, she might frame it and hang it on her wall. It could be that he didn't pay attention to anything that didn't start with a T or an A.

He was still groaning in pain, curled up on the floor. Daintily lifting her hem, she nudged him with the point of her toe. “Come on, get up. I think you’re overreacting,” she said.

“I think you broke something,” he whimpered, in a way that someone who has only heard whimpering described before might whimper. In other words, he merely sounded whiny and completely unbelievable.

“I did not!”

“You stabbed me with your shoe!” He uncurled enough to dramatically fling his arms to the side in order to reveal a gaping wound remarkably like the one painted on her dress, and much too big to have been hidden behind his hands. He stared at her expectantly.

She was clearly unimpressed. “You can’t really expect me to believe my shoe did that. Look, it doesn’t even have any blood on it.” She showed him the heel, which had mysteriously developed a case of dripping with blood in the last five seconds. She frowned and tried to shake it off.

He smirked, but when her gaze lanced over to him he clutched at the wound and groaned, trying to look pitiful. “Oh, I’m dyin’ here!” He stopped to think for a second –- that had to be one of his worst lies ever. “…Again!”

“Stop being so ridiculous. You’re a ghost, you can’t die again. I bet it doesn’t even hurt.” Having said this, she leant down and poked it, expecting a workup as superficial as her own faux gory hole.

Imagine her surprise when her whole arm fell through with a squish.

“OHMIGOD! Ohmigod, ohmigod, ohmigod!” She fell to her knees and tried to gently extricate her arm from his stomach. Her hand slipped on the wet linoleum under him and, fearful of hurting him, she had to stop. Her eyes flew to his. He was shaking! “Bee-“ She barely stopped herself from saying his name. Who knows what would happen if he was put Back in this condition! “Beej, talk to me! What can I do?!”

“There’s only one thing that you can do…” he said weakly, a muscle in his jaw spasming.

She leaned in closer as he trailed off. “What? What is it?”

“You can kiss it better!” He squeezed his eyes closed and puckered up.

Staring at the moss-encrusted lips he fully expected her to kiss, she steeled her nerves, took a deep breath…and actually thought about what she was doing. She sat back on her heels, nonplussed. He was not shaking in shock, but in laughter. He was a poltergeist that did not need to use any internal organs he might possess. But she was going to find some way to kill him. Again.

“You jerk!” She ripped her arm free of the squelchy mess and scrambled to her feet, fighting down nausea but determined to stomp on him even harder than before. 

“You’re such a jackass!”

Correctly inferring from her tone of voice that she wouldn't grant his simple request, he hurriedly opened his eyes and managed to roll out of the way just in time to avoid her descending heel. “Hey!” he said, leaping up before she could try again.

“I actually thought for one minute that you were – I don’t know what!” She really wanted to throw something at him, but doubted the veil she was clutching in a white-knuckled grip would make the sort of impression she wanted.

“That was stupid,” he said.

She lifted haunted eyes from contemplating her veil and asked, “Can’t you stop being an asshole for five minutes?” Then she calmly bent down and took off her shoes.

Long dormant and unused because so few things could actually harm him anymore, some instinct for self-preservation arose which made him think twice about replying with a flippant 'no.' At a loss, he said, “No?”

She chucked a spiky blue high heel at his head.

He ducked, cursing. It was obviously not a very good self-preservation instinct, seeing as he was dead as a doornail. 

“Stand still, damn it!” She threw the other heel at him. It clonked him square in the forehead, leaving a neat shoe print.

“What the fuck-!” He rubbed at the marks. They did not go away, and were in fact bruising.

Bereft of high-heeled ammunition, but still in the grip of rage, she threw her veil at him too. As she watched the veil she had borrowed from Barbara flutter halfway towards him and then land in the puddle of blood, she wished she hadn’t.

Beetlejuice’s rotten self-preservation instinct sensed a reprieve and urged him to – say something? Fix it? Do the hula? Anything had to be better than what he thought she’d do next, which was animating her shoes to hit him over and over. By the way she was staring fixedly, she wasn’t far off from figuring out how. He hurriedly got rid of all the blood and the wound he’d juiced, surreptitiously healing his head, too. “Look," he said, "I’m cured, it’s a goddamned miracle!”

She examined her arm, her sleeve as white as if the tattered cuff had never been stuck in anybody’s stomach.

“Lyds?” His rough voice was tentative, poking at her strange silence. The veil floated into his hands, drifting through the air like a pale, unblemished phantom. He cautiously advanced and plopped it on her head. Suddenly she was sporting the same riotous updo he’d stuck her in four years ago. She didn’t know where he’d learned about ratting, but if she ever found out there would be well-deserved bloodshed.

She pressed her lips together. “The last time you did my hair I was picking tangles out for weeks. You’d better not have just tied all my hair in knots.”

“Ahaha…would I do that?” he said. Her riotous hair fell into her normal softer, but still wild, style. “Seriously, babes, you wound me. Get it? Wound me?” Cackling, he pointed to the hole in his suit which he had neglected to fix, through which molding fish belly white skin flashed the universe. 

Gritting her teeth and casting about for the remains of her anger, she came up nearly empty-handed. So she said, “Yeah, I get it. Hilarious. Now shut up about it and fix your shirt already.” She just didn’t have the resources to be mad at him all the time. Her own biology seemed to be conspiring against her, running out of adrenaline and other vital anger ingredients. She envied him for a moment for not having any stupid biology, being dead and all. If she had ghostly powers, he’d be in a world of trouble!

He smoothed down his suit and the hole was gone. Her shoes nudged her feet. He was looking at her as if he expected her to yell at him for fetching them, too. She contemplated it, if only because it was still easier than thanking him for anything. In the end she just stepped into her heels, holding her train out of the way.

“You know, you can still change your mind,” she said. Whether it was to him or to herself, she didn’t know.

“Nah, babes.” He grinned, latching onto her waist. It wasn’t everyday that a hot chick demanded he marry her before they got to it. Actually, that had never happened before. The throwing stuff at him part, though, that had happened more than he liked to admit over the centuries. “I like a good scare!” he said. Also, he didn’t want to be pummeled with shoes for breaking up with her. He didn’t trust this strangely accepting mood she’d fallen into.

His hand started creeping down and she sighed, grabbing on and holding it out of sheer self-defense. “You just don’t quit, do you,” she said. 

He laughed and stole a kiss, his tongue darting in for a taste before she could even blink. She hadn’t had time to feel much of anything in the two second it took, but afterwards her lips tingled like a limb that had fallen asleep. She chewed on her lower lip. Was it supposed to be like that?

“So, um…how far is this marriage counselor, anyway?” She started walking again to get some distance, but he wasn’t moving. She had to turn and take a step backwards because he wouldn’t let go of her hand. Finally she looked up again and he was just as irritatingly smug as she’d thought he would be.

“We’re there, babes. Didn’t you notice the fucking huge sign? It’s kind of hard to miss.” He forked his thumb at a pair of institutional doors with a metal sign overhead that read ‘Department of Marital Relations’ in letters a foot high.

“That’s not suggestive at all, is it?” she remarked.

He snorted, reeling her back in by the arm. “I could suggest some…marital relations to ya….” 

Before he could wrap himself around her again, though, she twined her fingers through his and stationed their joined hands at her side. Merely so that he couldn't grope her anymore, and not at all because she liked holding his clammy, moldy hand. Because she didn’t. The deceptive strength of his grip was in no way reassuring in the sterile confines of the otherworldly bureaucracy, where a pervasive, numbing malaise was soaking into her bones. It was no place for the living.

He was pulling on the push handle of the door when she remembered what she had wanted to ask in the first place. “Hey,” she said.

“Goddamned doors – this is bullshit! They can’t ban me from an entire fuckin’ division-”

She squeezed his hand. “Hey!”

“What?!” He let go of the push bar with one final yank that bent it with a groan of tortured metal.

She dug her nails in his palm and narrowed her eyes at him as he winced. “You’re supposed to push, moron.”

“I knew that.” He straightened his tie, rolling his shoulders while he surreptitiously tried to free his hand.

She held on tighter. “Anyway. Why did we have to take the long way when you can just open a door and make it go where you want?”

“This here’s a government building. Y'think the administrative assholes would make it that easy to get around?” He gave up on tugging his hand free and shoved their joined hands in his pocket.

Unidentifiable squirming things made her let go. “EW!” she squealed. Beating a hasty retreat, she shook her hand frantically, but the little snake that had hitched a ride on her clung like a vine. “Get it off!”

“It’s just a garden snake. It ain’t gonna hurt ya none,” he said. He did not lift a finger to help her, as that would mean removing his hands from the safety of his pockets and entering grabbing range. Her girly nails were sharp. But he did add, “Moron.”

“I hate snakes!” She attempted to pry the slender creature off while touching it as little as possible. It was dry and smooth and the skin gave until she could feel the pencil-thin ribcage wriggling. “Mice, rats, moths, bats, spiders…I like them! Why did it have to be a snake?!”

Now he was just plain offended. “I was a snake when you met me!”

“Yeah, and I hated you then, too. It was not what I’d call ‘meeting’!” The green menace gave up on being her bracelet and slithered up her sleeve and down her bra, where it curled up and made itself at home. Her flesh crawled. She poked at it insistently but it wasn’t budging, and there was no way to move the interloper without removing the lace that was obscuring her décolleté.

“Looks like you’ve got a problem there, babes. I wouldn’t be much of a gentleman if I didn’t help my gorgeous fiancée out, now, would I?” His grin was so wide, she could’ve sworn he grew extra teeth.

“If only I had known at the tender age of fifteen that the barest hint of possibly getting to touch my breasts would make you so helpful. I would have bargained more instead of agreeing to your first damned demand!” As unappealing as the notion of partially undressing in front of Beetlejuice was, she wasn’t quite sure which slithery fiend was worse – the one already in her underwear, or the one that wanted to get in her underwear.

“Oh ho, is that so?” Impossibly, the grin grew wider and more teeth appeared. “Well, maybe I want to actually get a lil’ something for my trouble this time, y'know what I mean?” He waggled his crazy eyebrows.

“Don’t push your luck. I’m honoring that deal, even if it is four years later, you opportunistic ass. You can keep your trouble to yourself, as far as I’m concerned,” she said forcefully. The garden snake twitched its tail and settled deeper, which made up her mind. She shuddered at the unpleasantly cool tickle. Screw the slightly taller bastard, the little one had to go! She backed out of range and reached for the zipper hidden behind the faux buttons at the mandarin collar.

“Sure ‘bout that, babes?” He flipped out a switchblade, monogrammed and inlaid with black and white striped mother of pearl.

Her brow furrowed. “The hell?”

“Cut a hole,” he said, gesturing at the collar of her dress with the knife while she leaned away instinctively. “Then ya don’t gotta take it all off. But if ya really wanna, don’t mind me. I’ll just kick back and enjoy the free show.” He held out the handle to her, smirking.

She put out her hand to take it, but he snatched it back out of reach. Her tentative smile flat lined.

“Ah-ah! What’ll ya gimme for it? I got a few ideas if ya can’t think of anything….” His eyes traced a lecherous path over her figure, lingering on her chest.

Her fists clenched. Reasoning with him got nowhere fast. The snake in her bra hissed, jostled by her strident breaths. “Hm,” she said, putting on the innocently thoughtful expression which had fooled many an authority figure and tapping a finger against her mouth. She circled behind him. 

He started to turn, watching her skeptically, but stilled as she trailed her fingers over his shoulders and stood close enough behind him to lean in a little and whisper in his ear. Her nose wrinkled at the smell of stagnant water and cigarettes. 

“How about,” she said, her fingers walking down his chest to where he was clutching the switchblade slackly, “nothing?” She tugged the blade free, dancing away.

By the time he snapped his hanging jaw shut and turned around scowling, it was done. In fact, his jaw dropped back open. Lydia had just plucked the lace away from her skin and started sawing delicately when the aging material had ripped off, leaving a hanky-sized hole that revealed the plunging neckline of the bustier underneath. Eying the snippet of fabric dispassionately, she used it to scoop out the garden snake and bundle it up unhappily in one efficient move. Finally, she could breathe easy.

Or not. There were other things to consider.

Meanwhile, Beetlejuice sidled up to her. He plucked the fabric wrapped snake and his switchblade out of her grasp, and pocketed both. Damn, he knew a hole big enough to fit a hand through would be big enough to peek, but damn!

“I was going to sew that back on,” she pointed out, crossing her arms over her chest to try and block his view.

“So what now?” He craned his neck to the right and continued staring.

“The lace. Back on.”

“I have no idea what you’re yammering about, babes,” he said airily, patting his pocket contentedly. Yes, he decided, it was much better to be able to look anytime he wanted rather than a one-time thing. “But, y’know, seeing as you did, in fact, use my property in a manner consistent with our deal, vis-à-vis, help for certain rewards…I think ya owe me.” He reached for her cleavage.

She shoved his hand away. She hadn’t got rid of one intruder in her bra just to gain another! “And I think I offered you nothing,” she said.  
He grabbed his lapels and rocked back on his heels to pontificate. “However, being that I didn’t accept ‘nothing’ as a counter-offer, I repeat: You owe me.” He made another move for his chosen prize.

Successfully blocking, she refuted his argument, saying, “By that logic, there was no deal to begin with because I didn’t agree to your proposed bargain in the first place.”

“But! Ya proposed a counter-offer, which implies an unspoken agreement. Therefore, ya have to lemme touch ‘em!” He threw down his arms in a huff.

“No!”

“Aww, c’mon! Why the hell not?!” He tried to slide his hand in under her arms from the side. 

Her elbow put an end to that idea. “This is a public corridor!”

“So?! Nobody’ll bother us! ...Not if they know what’s good for ‘em.” He had the bright idea of putting her in a headlock and had wormed his other hand through her defenses, when the door they were fighting in front of opened and an elderly couple came out.

Lydia froze, hunched over protectively under Beetlejuice, who took the opportunity to cup one breast and loosened the headlock to stroke her neck. Lydia mutely worried her lip, yanking on his hand and straightening up. 

He said, “Hi. How ya doin’?”

The old woman, wearing a hospital gown draped around her worn, skeletal frame, tittered and hid a smile. The old man looked like he was about to run a marathon, except for the lividity purpling of his skin. He winked at them and said, “Come on dear, let’s leave these two kids to themselves.” The elderly couple walked off, holding hands and smiling. The old woman sighed something about young love.

“Hey!” Beetlejuice said. “I’m older’n both of ya combined.”

Either they didn’t hear, or they just laughed it off.

Lydia found her voice. “You…PERVERT! Leering, ANCIENT, grabby, DEMENTED PERVERT!”

He gave one last gentle squeeze and let go, his hand trailing up to her shoulder where he rubbed his thumb over her collarbone. He growled, “Cocktease,” in her ear.

She ducked out of the circle of his arms and shoved him as hard as she dared. “Argh!”

Stumbling back a few feet, he went on as if uninterrupted. “Ya can’t just offer a guy, y’know an everyday Joe like myself, the moon…luminous, full moons,” he went on, his hands cupped in front of him like he was weighing something, “and then tell ‘em he can’t touch! He only gets ta look at it, so tantalizingly close…it’s inhumane!” 

“Besides the fact that I didn’t offer you ANYTHING, that’s what the moon is for! Looking and not touching! If you hadn’t noticed, it’s way far off in the sky!” She just wanted to lay down and beat her forehead on the floor until her brain felt not as broken. 

“So it ain’t a perfect simile, call it poetic license.” He took a drag on a cig that he pulled lit out of nowhere.

She took the cigarette and dropped it on the ground, where she proceeded to viciously grind it under her heel. “That’s.” Stomp. “A.” Stomp. “Metaphor!” Stomp. 

“And NO smoking.” Feeling unutterably drained, she hooked her arm through his to make him support some of her weight and said, “Let’s just get this over with.”

He quirked a brow at the sad remains of his smoke. “Yes m’m.” He saluted, then kicked open the door.

They went through.


	4. In Which Our Hero and His Bride Make an Appointment

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoops, haven't been getting the italics formatting right! Expect that to change.

PREVIOUSLY:

She took the cigarette and dropped it on the ground, where she proceeded to viciously grind it under her heel. "That's." Stomp. "A." Stomp. "Metaphor!" Stomp. "And NO smoking." Feeling unutterably drained, she hooked her arm through his to make him support some of her weight and said, "Let's just get this over with."

He quirked a brow at the sad remains of his smoke. "Yes m'm." He saluted, then kicked open the door.

They went through.

AND NOW, ON WITH THE STORY!

 

CHAPTER FOUR: In Which Our Hero and His Bride Make an Appointment

 

The grey doors opened on a dreary room designed to wear the soul down to hopelessness – in other words, it looked like a Department of Motor Vehicles lobby. It was filled with people, some of whom Lydia would hesitate to even call ghosts, they were so clearly nonhuman. Beetlejuice headed directly for one of the receptionists, but she dragged on his arm. 

“There’s a queue, see?”

“Yeah, I saw it the last damn time I was here and I didn’t bother with the fucker then, either.”

“You can’t do that,” she said, aghast.

“Sure I can – watch me.” He started off again only for her to pull him back.

“I mean you shouldn’t!”

He sighed gustily, looking at the ceiling as if beseeching a higher power for patience he did not possess to deal with this trial. Then, tapping his foot as his gaze turned to her, he asked, “And why is that?”

“Because it’s….” As she looked into burning green eyes staring out of cadaverous black eye sockets, the words ‘not polite’ died unspoken. She tried again. “How would you like it if you’d been waiting a long time and someone cut in front of you?” she said, then maneuvered them into last place in a line that went on for a mile.

The construction worker in front of them abruptly turned his head, revealing the caved in half of his skull, and she realized he’d been nervously eyeing them.

Beetlejuice loudly announced, “I don’t wait behind anyone, no matter what they do.” He sneered at the skittish glances aimed their way.

Then the construction worker stepped to the side and said gruffly, “You and the missus can go in front of me, Mr. Juice.” If he could remove the pieces of his hard hat, she had a feeling he’d be holding them in the classic ‘Ai, Senor, The Banditos Are Coming’ pose. They had hardly passed him with a murmured thanks from Lydia when the next person in line, an Indian man in a turban with dark bruises on his face, bowed them ahead of him with a strangely angled arm. Then the next and the next and the next, until they were strolling arm in arm down a line parted like the Red Sea. A wave of tense whispering broke out behind them.

Wide-eyed, she asked in an aside, “What did you do the last time you were here?”

“I was applying for our marriage license, a’ course.” He smirked. 

She blinked. “Do we need to renew that?” she asked. She hadn’t realized that they’d needed one in the first place, but given the Neitherworld bureaucracy’s penchant for paperwork, she probably should have expected it. Perhaps her time would have been better spent researching marriage arrangements instead of contract negotiations. She had only skimmed that chapter in the Handbook. Clearly she’d missed important details while looking for mentions of the living marrying the dead.

“Nah, s’good for afterlife,” he said.

“Wait a minute! When did you have time for that?” She tightened her hand around his elbow as if he might run off and eyed him suspiciously. How long had he been scheming to trap her, specifically, in marriage? His answer had the potential to change everything, although she hesitated to define exactly why she cared so much. With her dying breath she would deny some of the more lurid things her imagination had come up with in the months she spent brooding over their unfinished deal. (He clearly had not been plotting "Exorcist"-styled revenge against her, for one thing.)

“I was in a big fucking hurry,” he said, rubbing his moldy stubble musingly. He couldn’t exactly tell her that he’d heard ol’ Chucky-boy and that fashion disaster discussing the upcoming meeting when they were carrying the model downstairs. Or that he had figured out that the ritual Otho was considering was actually an exorcism, and sensing a prime set up, he had rushed off to prepare for their upcoming nuptials instead of trying to prevent it. Somehow he didn’t see her being swayed by the fact that there was really fuck all he could have done about it while two inches tall.

“Uh-huh. And when exactly was this?” she said.

“Have I told you that’s one hell of a dress?” He wouldn’t meet her gaze. Mostly because his eyes had gravitated to her bust line.

She rolled her eyes. “No. You do realize that I’ll be able to read the issue date when I sign the marriage license.”

“Ya don’t gotta sign it, I did it for ya.”

“You forged my signature?!” Stopping abruptly, she realized she was shouting when every eye in the place focused on them outright, forgoing the furtive staring.

The tall, ragged, and blood-stained black-robed form of a bystander piped up in a surprisingly squeaky voice. “Is that really very surprising? Considering….” He waved his scythe at Beetlejuice.

Snapping around, Lydia said, “And who asked you?”

“Yeah, can it!” Beetlejuice added, wiping imaginary sweat off his brow at the near miss. Go diversionary tactics! She’d have been mad about his power of attorney whenever she found out about it anyway. She was such a control freak. Don’t do this, don’t do that…blah, blah, blah.

Lydia elbowed Beetlejuice. “You shut it!” she said.

Sheepishly tugging his hood back, the red-haired, freckled teenager said, “Sorry.”

Looking at the thirty-something woman in a fairy princess costume hovering over him, Lydia asked, “Aren’t you a…little young to be getting married?” She added ‘to her’ in her head.

Her bloody ruin of a throat wobbling, the woman laughed deprecatingly and said, “I know I’ve only been dead for five years and Ritchie’s been kicking around the Neitherworld since the fifties,” here she took his hand and they shared a loving smile, “but we really connect, you know?”

“We’re real gone,” Ritchie said. “We met at support group. Not everybody understands what it’s like to be stuck in a dumb costume forever.”

“You wouldn’t believe how awful it is.” She leaned forward confidingly, the skimpy cut of her costume revealing her generous assets. “I think I’ve heard every dirty princess pun there is.”

Lydia checked out of the corner of her eyes to see if Beetlejuice was looking. She was pleasantly surprised to find that he was pointedly yawning and checking his three watches. “I might have an inkling.” She held up her veil and smiled cynically.

Beetlejuice cleared his throat in a long and drawn out hacking fashion. “Nice chattin’ with ya stiffs, but me and Lyds gotta get goin’.” The costumed couple laughed as if that was funny as he yanked her away.

Lydia could hear them talking to each other: ‘What’s a nice girl like that doing with him?’ ‘I dunno, she wasn’t very nice to me at first.’ ‘That’s ‘cause you don’t know when to keep your mouth shut.’ ‘And you do? Practically told her enough to write a book.’ ‘You helped, so don’t give me that…’

And then the progressively audible voices were out of earshot.

Beetlejuice was stalking past the multitude getting out of his way and she had to scramble to keep up. A little out of breath, she said, “Don’t think I’m going to forget about you forging my signature.”

He snorted. “Wouldn’t dream of it. Not that it’s, y’know, technic’ly a forgery.”

“Really. Do tell,” she said dryly.

“Ya remember when ya made me the happiest dead guy in the world by agreeing ta marry me?” He clasped his hand over his heart.

Rolling her eyes, she said, “Yeah, sure. What does that have to do with it?”

“Weeeeeeeelllllll….”

“Spit it out – no, don’t, just say it already!”

“That’s like an oral contract, heh, oral…that basic’ly gives me ‘carte blanche,’” he said making air quotes, “with stuff like signing for you on the marriage license.”

She nodded, pursing her lips. Slowly she said, “And answering for me during the ceremony, right?”

“Yeah, that.” He scratched at a particularly virulent green patch of mold on his neck.

“I had wondered about it,” she said. She resettled her arm around his and continued on down the line. Her eyelids were really getting heavy. It felt like the circles under her eyes were deepening even as she spoke. “I didn’t think it could actually count if I wasn’t the one saying it.”

His shoulders un-hunched from their preemptive defensive posture and he gaped at her. “That’s it? No elbows or glares or shoes thrown at me? Just…” He made his voice high and squeaky. “ _I wondered about it_.” Considering his previous performances, it was a rather poor imitation.

“Like you said at the time, it’s not as if you wrote the rules.” She fought back a yawn.

He opened and shut his mouth without saying anything, looking at her suspiciously. Maybe he shouldn’t push his luck. He burst out with, “But I took advantage of an obvious loophole!”

She ignored his attempt to goad her, aware of the irritating fact that when she got sidetracked into getting angry at him, she never got any answers. Plenty of practice aiming, but no answers. “Why’s it written that way, anyway?” she asked.

Thrown off his game by her sudden temperance, he said, “So that both a’ the schmucks makin’ an agreement don’t hafta clutter up the Neitherworld gettin’ the paperwork done.”

What he didn’t bother to add, not being inclined to be particularly helpful at the best of times, was that it made things easier for ghosts bound to a particular haunting who couldn’t come in person, or spirit as it were, which was an obscure bit of trivia she’d come across in her research into the handbooks. The far-reaching applications were not immediately apparent in the wording, but if you picked apart the terms…yeah. It could apply to living people, or give you the power to carry out the agreement with just about anyone you made a deal with. The deplorable way he twisted it to his own use was actually sort of ingenious. 

“Based on the assumption that your word is your contract, huh?” she said musingly.

“Fuck if I care why.” He snottily turned up his nose.

She sighed. So much for their grown-up, intelligent, rational exchange of information. At least he was keeping his various appendages to himself as they walked. It would have been much faster to just go straight up to the receptionist, but by now they were smack dab in the middle of the byzantine structure of the roped off queue. All they could do was keep going with the assembled throng getting out of their way and pulling aside their neighbors as fast as they realized who was standing behind them with a grin on his face.

Although, with the sheer number of people in line, quite a few were beautiful women, or at least woman-shaped. The hawk wings and clawed feet of one clearly female creature with bones woven in her matted hair suggested harpy rather than ghost. The harpy was chatting over the rope to a different section of the queue with a shambling mess of limbs and heads, of which any of the five could be talking, sometimes all at once. It was wearing a mutilated business suit with five ties and carried a briefcase.

Lydia tried not to stare, fascinated, but Beetlejuice had no such compunctions. He did not even have the word ‘compunction’ in his vocabulary, never mind feeling the prickling of his conscience. Were his eyes straying to greener pastures already? 

As soon as this self-pitying thought crossed her mind, the comparison of cleavage to pasture bloomed into a full-blown mental image of her chest covered with grass like Beej’s mold and tiny black sheep frolicking, which were much cuter than a certain garden snake which had recently inhabited her ‘rolling hills.’ This wrenched out tortured giggles which she tried in vain to smother. That was just as bad as moons!

“Whatcha laughin’ at?” Beetlejuice asked, shaking her arm. 

She looked up at him, laughter in her tired brown eyes. “Nothing, I guess.”

He was quirking one wicked eyebrow bemusedly. “Anybody ever tell ya you’re one crazy chick?” he asked.

Her giggles caught in her throat. “Yeah,” she croaked out. “Lots of times. I don’t think…anybody ever said it to me quite like that, though.”

Narrowing his eyes warily, he said, “Like what?”

Smiling shyly at him, she replied lightly, “Like it wasn’t a bad thing. You know, you’re pretty crazy yourself.”

As they made their way to the front of the line it was like walking backwards in time, with appearances getting progressively Victorian. But now she hardly paid attention to that, as she noticed him watching her in her peripheral vision. And he wasn't just staring at her breasts or something, although his gaze lingered there often enough.

Beetlejuice found himself bewildered and he didn’t like it. One. Bit. And he couldn’t even get mad about it, because she’d smiled at him. Nobody smiled at him, not like that. They bared their teeth or smirked or snarled. What business did she have smiling at him?! He liked it, especially the pale little blush that he’d bet just about anything went _all_ the way down, but…he couldn’t even figure out why calling her crazy made her so goddamn happy. He was pretty sure if he said it again, with heartfelt conviction, she’d get pissed.

At the front of the line was a consumptive woman in a white nightgown billowing in an insubstantial wind. She barred their path, while holding onto the collar of a miserable, well-built man in a priest’s frock who was huddling at her feet. Burning with shadowy power, she shouted, “I have worked too hard and waited too long to give up my place in line! I was cheated in life, I _will_ have my due in death!”

Beetlejuice, already annoyed, just mimed taking a deep breath and blowing out a candle. The ghostly woman’s power snuffed out with a sizzle. He cackled.

“Ah…maybe I was being a bit hasty,” she squeaked, looking terribly ordinary and timid with her nightgown and long brown hair hanging limply.

The priest levered himself to his feet like the cracking of a gargoyle and led her to the side with his hands on her shoulders. “Please forgive Gertrude, she’s been a bit…carried away for the last century,” he said in a hollow voice.

“NEXT!” The grumpy word resounded throughout the entire room for the first time since they’d  
gone in.

Lydia, looking at the woman who had been first in line and was now quietly weeping on the priest’s shoulder, said, “Maybe….”

“Nah.” Beetlejuice vetoed that idea immediately and dragged her forward. As they cleared the final roped-in hurdle, he turned and made one of his nastier faces at the schmucks still in line. Much screaming and fainting ensued. 

When Lydia turned to see what the hell was going on, he’d already put the medusa snakes away and his skin back on. Her eyes darted between the pandemonium that used to be a fairly orderly queue to his smugly satisfied smirk and decided she didn’t want to know. With the way everybody’d been acting, he probably could’ve gotten the same reaction by shouting ‘Boo!’

They went up to the free receptionist who was glaring blindly ahead. “What do you want?” she said in a heavily accented voice. There was a name badge pinned to her draped ancient Greek dress that read, ‘Hi! My name is KARA, how may I help you?’ Her immobile face read, ‘You can go take a flying leap for all I care.’ 

Beetlejuice leaned against the counter, having taken this in at a glance, and said smarmily, “So Kara-”

The receptionist interrupted. “It’s Chara, _actually_.”

“Whatever.” He waved this little complication away. “We,” he said, tucking Lydia into his side, “want to see a marriage counselor right away.”

“You probably need it,” Chara said, sneering, “but we are booked solid until nineteen hundred ninety five.” Not once looking at anything, she jerkily tapped the appointment book in front of her. It flipped open to show pages filled in nearly black with names, dates, and times.  
Out of the corner of his mouth, Beetlejuice whispered to Lydia, “What year’s it now?”

“1992,” Lydia said wide-eyed.

“Why don’t we just blow this fucking popsicle stand and hunt down a preacher, whaddaya say?” He grinned while waiting for an answer, but if he had been alive, his heart would've been beating madly. Visiting his lawyer had been a diversion, and an excuse to annoy Newt. This was the crucial ploy, the pivotal moment. Would she give up her hare-brained scheme to curb his imaginary faults? He was counting on the fact that the newly dead clung to their old living concepts of time. It wasn’t that long a wait, when you had eternity.

“I dunno…” she said. She had to admit that not waiting for three years sounded like a great idea. If you ignored the consequences of marrying a randy poltergeist, that is. But she was pretty sure that she couldn't string him along for years. He was bound to notice that she had a pulse eventually, if the need to eat and sleep and breathe and shower didn’t tip him off. Getting older would be a big clue. And then what?

Meanwhile the other two receptionists had stopped working, much to the consternation of the people they were supposed to be hindering. They were looking at Chara with mingled admiration and apprehension. The nearest one sidled over and murmured, “You do know that’s B, E, T, E, L, G, U, E, S, E, right?”

“No, do not tell me….” Chara’s face, stuck in a permanent screwed-up grimace, twitched.

“He won’t go away unless he gets what he wants!”

“Then we are doomed, for all the counselors are busy.”

“What’s he want to see a counselor for?”

“I did not ask.”

The last receptionist leaned over to contribute. “Well…what about Heidi? She has a break coming up, and she’s always been a sucker for the ones that look like her daughter.”

“B-”

“Shh!” The two flanking receptionists shushed Chara with much agitated gesturing that she couldn’t see anyway, being blind.

“HE does not look like…?”

“No, but his girl does.”

“Poor thing.”

“What, for looking like Heidi’s kid?”

“No, for getting stuck with HIM!”

“Shh! What if he heard you?!”

“Get back to work, O Morai.” Chara rapped on the counter with a series of spastic movements to get the unlucky couple’s attention. “We can fit you in today at seven after three afternoon. Go to the thirteenth office when the time is right.” The appointment book flipped open and their appointment bled onto the page from within, squeezing between two lines and into the margins. Jerkily, she pointed down a hallway, barely avoiding putting her finger up Lydia’s nose.

Startled out of his staring contest with Lydia, Beetlejuice’s jaw dropped open. “Wait, what? You can?!” he exclaimed.

Seemingly paralyzed like an ancient Greek statue in her pose of sybil service, Chara said, “Go. Go now.”

“Thank you very much!” Lydia said, drawing Beetlejuice away by the elbow from the counter where he was glaring murderously at Chara.

“Yeah. Thanks a lot,” he muttered back over his shoulder. “I’m gonna remember this, y’know!”

The other two receptionists shared a look that was part sympathetic grimace and part ‘damn, I’m glad that’s not me.’


	5. In Which Waiting Is Boring

PREVIOUSLY:

Chara rapped on the counter with a series of spastic movements to get the unlucky couple’s attention. “We can fit you in today at seven after three afternoon. Go to the thirteenth office when the time is right.” The appointment book flipped open and their appointment bled onto the page from within, squeezing between two lines and into the margins. Jerkily, she pointed down a hallway, barely avoiding putting her finger up Lydia’s nose.

Startled out of his staring contest with Lydia, Beetlejuice’s jaw dropped open. “Wait, what? You can?!” he exclaimed.

Seemingly paralyzed like an ancient Greek statue in her pose of sybil service, Chara said, “Go. Go now.”

“Thank you very much!” Lydia said, drawing Beetlejuice away by the elbow from the counter where he was glaring murderously at Chara.

“Yeah. Thanks a lot,” he muttered back over his shoulder. “I’m gonna remember this, y’know!”

The other two receptionists shared a look that was part sympathetic grimace and part ‘damn, I’m glad that’s not me.’

AND NOW, ON WITH THE STORY!

 

Chapter Five: In Which Waiting Is Boring

 

A smiling Lydia, pulling a thin-lipped Beetlejuice along, wandered over to a waiting area with chairs and coffee tables overflowing with magazines. All of the chairs were taken, as well as the tables and makeshift stacks of magazines. Beetlejuice just sat on a convenient patch of air and put his feet up, crossing his arms and scowling.

This left her somewhat at loose ends. The Neitherworlders here were either of a sterner stock or he hadn’t terrorized them before. They didn’t seem inclined to do more than inch slightly away, hanging on to their seats with grim determination. So unless she felt like racing the other standees for a seat when someone left, she was out of luck. Judging by their expressions, they were ready and willing to lie, cheat, and sell their grandmas for one of the chairs. One in particular of indeterminate gender, wearing a flannel shirt with the arms ripped off and torn-up jeans over full-body fur, wrinkled a half-human, half-wolf nose and snarled. He or she was either a lumberjack or very butch. Lydia decided not to risk it.

Resigning herself to standing, she plucked a magazine off the floor. The cover was tattered, but from what she could piece together it was the December issue of Gothic Bride. Flipping through it, she found herself unable to concentrate. First her feet started hurting. Her spiky blue high heels weren’t exactly meant for running around in, and now that she wasn’t being dragged around and pestered by a certain poltergeist the sole abuse was catching up to her. Then the not inconsiderable weight of her dress started trying to drag her tired body down. She wondered how long they had been in the Neitherworld, for her to feel this worn out. Hours?

She snuck a look at Beetlejuice out of the corner of her eye. He was still pouting, but had added muttering darkly to himself to his repertoire.

“What time is it, anyway?” she asked him, pretending to read the magazine.

“How the hell should I know?”

“You’ve got three watches!”

“So?”

“So look at them!”

“You’re so hot under the collar ‘bout it, why don’t you?”

Staring flatly at him, she got up on tiptoe and leaned in to check the watch faces exposed on his wrist by his crossed arms. One was all dirty broken glass, the digital one kept blinking 13:13, and the last one was just abominably slow. It ticked every three seconds, then four, two, six, and so on. “Why are you wearing three busted watches?”

He glared at them. “What are ya talkin’ about?” He tapped the irregular ticker. “This one’s still goin’?”

“It’s slow.”

“How can ya tell?”

“By counting!”

“Hmph.” He crossed his arms again emphatically. “Whatever.”

“I just wanted to know how long we had to wait.”

He muttered something laced with profanity under his breath.

She sighed and went back to her magazine, shifting from foot to foot. She could feel blisters forming by the minute, she really could. And she was just so tired…it was like something was sucking the life out of her. Finally she asked him, “Is there room up there for two?”

He said flatly, “Ya’d hafta sit on my lap.” That was a lie, and he fully expected her to refuse like a boring prude and demand that he juice up a chair or something, because that was just the way his day was shaping up. Just when he thought he was getting somewhere, some cosmic force, some narrative causality, some sorry-ass motherfucking bitch of fate shut him down. That damn receptionist had better watch out! …What the hell was her name again? Karen? Well, he wasn’t falling for it anymore!

“Oh,” she said, taken aback by his tone. “If you don’t want me to…”

She was saying yes? “Hell yeah, I want ya to!” He scooped her up and deposited her crookedly in his lap, his hands taking up proprietary positions around her hips. “Make yourself right at home!” Even though he’d said it, he was stunned when she did just that.

Kicking off her torturous shoes, she leaned back into the comforting solidity of his chest. His ghostly aura felt warm in the Neitherworld’s chilling malaise. Since everyone’d been staring anyway and he wasn’t even trying to stick his hand down her bra, why not? Might as well give them something to stare at. She flipped open her magazine once again and was finally able to concentrate on the article about finding the perfect church graveyard.

Beetlejuice rested his chin in the crook of her half-frozen shoulder, unable to believe his luck but perfectly content to take advantage of it by looking straight down her shirt. Hell, she’d practically told him to: ‘that’s what they’re for, looking at!’ And while he was at it, he banished her spiky shoes. After all, some luck you had to make yourself.

They peaceably spent several minutes this way – him captivated by the rise and fall of twin perfection, her reading with an increasing sense of incredulity. An article such as ‘How to protect guests from exorcism on consecrated ground’ was followed by ‘How to make your own special cemetery in your backyard on a budget - tips on consecrating the ground for that spooky tingle’ and 'Making sure the headstones don’t clash with your theme: 10 easy lessons in engraving.’

Then, just as he started wondering what that pulsing beat flowing through her neck under his chin was, Lydia turned to the fashion plates. Distracted by the interesting things her snickering was doing to her chest, he caught a glimpse of unimaginable, glossy-paged atrocities.

“What the hell is that supposed to be?” he said, grabbing the magazine and dragging it closer so he could examine it, his eyebrows somewhere in the region of his hairline.

She shoved the magazine out of her face. “I’m guessing a bridesmaid.” It was then that she noticed something. “You have another watch?”

Dropping half the magazine to let it dangle, he pushed his sleeve back farther to check his timepieces. “Ayep.”

“Well, what’s wrong with the fourth one?”

“Nothing! Look!”

So she did, and he was right. It was an old windup pocket watch duct-taped to a wristband, merrily ticking away. “It’s only 12:09? Great.” She slumped bonelessly against him. “We’ve got a couple hours to kill. You don’t have a deck of cards, do you?”

“Maaaaybe,” he said, uncertain whether or not he wanted to fish out his nude-mermaid-backed deck. He didn’t mind cheating, but she’d probably insist on a more traditional poker setup. That would mean not sitting in his lap so he couldn’t see her cards, or even down her shirt. Talk about cruelty! Never mind that he was perfectly happy to show her his if she’d show him hers (and not just cards, heh). Not that the cards in his hand usually stayed the hand he was dealt.

“Or,” she said, sitting up straight and half turning to look at him, “we could go back to my, um, haunt for a while. I’ve got a lot of unpacking to do…” That is, if her stuff was still there and she hadn’t been declared a missing person, because of the time difference between the two planes.

He blinked. Yeah. They could do that. Nobody had to wait here, as long as they came back in time for their appointment. Most of ‘em did, though, just to make sure they didn’t miss their time slot. The appointment books here didn't believe in rescheduling, or opening the doors for someone who was five seconds late. He raised his eyebrows and pursed his lips. And if he happened to be doing something to Lydia that made her forget all about even having an appointment… Well, what could ya do?

She took his contemplative silence for a ‘No’ and tried to sweeten the pot. “We could order takeout!” Now that she’d been in the Neitherworld, she really wanted to get out again, where she could get warm. She’d noticed her breath crystallizing in the air.

“You can talk over a phone line?” he asked, a little impressed. It was easier than making people see you in some ways, because if they couldn’t actually see that you were dead, they were less likely to go into denial and ignore you as being impossible. But not many ghosts managed it, and definitely not newly dead.

Shit! She’d forgotten about that. Think, think! “Nooo…but you can, right?” She smiled widely and hoped he bought it.

He smirked. “Damn straight! Ghost with the most here, babes! Let’s get the hell outta Dodge!” 

So they did.


	6. In Which Not All Her Base Are Belong to Him

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning, this chapter is like make-out city. So if Lydia/Beej is not your cup of tea you may wish to avert your eyes.

PREVIOUSLY:

She took his contemplative silence for a ‘No’ and tried to sweeten the pot. “We could order takeout!” Now that she’d been in the Neitherworld, she really wanted to get out again, where she could get warm. She’d noticed her breath crystallizing in the air.

“You can talk over a phone line?” he asked, a little impressed. It was easier than making people see you in some ways, because if they couldn’t actually see that you were dead, they were less likely to go into denial and ignore you as being impossible. But not many ghosts managed it, and definitely not newly dead.

Shit! She’d forgotten about that. Think, think! “Nooo…but you can, right?” She smiled widely and hoped he bought it.

He smirked. “Damn straight! Ghost with the most here, babes! Let’s get the hell outta Dodge!” 

So they did. 

AND NOW, ON WITH THE STORY!

 

Chapter Six: In Which Not All Her Base Are Belong to Him

 

Tossing the magazine on the werewolf’s head and throwing Lydia over his shoulder, Beetlejuice kicked off and backstroked to the nearest door, a janitor’s closet. Before she had time to protest the hurl-worthy indignity of being treated like a sack, he shoved the door inwards when it was clearly supposed to open outwards. Then they were through and he was slamming shut the beige door of her beige dormitory.

The flood of un-air-conditioned August heat prickling over her frozen skin was an exquisite torture. She groaned and squeezed her eyes shut as he slid her off his shoulder, letting her body drag down his until her toes brushed the floor and their mouths were level. Without the heels, she was much shorter than him. Where they touched there was no pain, only the numbing feeling of his aura.

“Alright, Lyds?” he rumbled.

“Yeah.” Her head lolled back and she opened her eyes. “I’m great.” She smiled punch-drunkenly as she started to shiver again. She hadn’t realized when it had stopped, and what a bad sign that was. Now it was back, and she would be fine, right? A little longer though, and he really would have a ghost fiancée stuck in a Halloween costume! She laughed at her own morbidly unfunny humor. It was startling to know that she had come so close to death and _hadn’t really noticed_ until it was nearly too late. Would she have only felt that she was suddenly so much less tired, that the cold wasn’t so terrible, when she died and took a step forward, leaving her body behind to fall to the floor? 

“Did I forget my shoes there?” she asked.

“Dunno,” he said and shrugged, jostling her against his paunch. Her feet dangled helplessly off the ground, his arm firmly clasping her hips to his with an unreal strength, one hand splayed on her backside. “You don’t wanna go back now, do ya?”

He moved in to kiss her, but she twisted to look around the room, thankfully still full of all her boxes. She said, “I suppose I can find them when we go back later.” If she could go back at all.

His lips hit her jaw line instead of her mouth, but he decided to go with it. 

“Put me down already so I can find the takeout menus,” she said, shoving weakly at his shoulders. She didn’t actually think her legs would support her.

He mumbled around her earlobe, “Howzabout – no.” If she thought she was going to wriggle out of this, after being such a fucking tease…she had another thing coming! But she could wriggle her sweet ass all she wanted. 

A tendril of warmth uncurled in her beneath the breaking ice as he laid open-mouthed kisses on her neck. When he reached the high collar of her dress and moved away she made a little disappointed noise.

Supporting her with a hand between her shoulder blades, he bent her back and chuckled against her sternum. “Like that, do ya, babes?” he said. His gruff voice vibrated deliciously through her chest.

“Hm…?” 

As he nuzzled into the cleavage exposed by her torn bodice she realized she was letting him take liberties she should have hit him for, yet here she was clutching at his shoulders! And she didn’t care, not as long as he fed the warmth pooling low in her stomach. A little voice was whispering, ‘You’re not dying of ghostly plane hypothermia anymore! Might as well live a little, wink wink nudge nudge.’ She didn’t normally listen to that voice, but it seemed to have the right idea at the moment. He didn’t have any body heat to share, but there were ways to raise your core temperature…it was for her health.

He sat her down on a ledge of nothing, insinuating himself between her knees. The hand on her ass got in one last squeeze before running down her thigh to start gathering up her skirt. Meanwhile his questing mouth sought out a nipple. He curled his tongue around the rosy pebble and groaned, making her tremble. She really did have the most perfect breasts he’d ever seen. He’d almost swear they were warm and alive. (That reminded him that he was vaguely pissed she had tried to marry some other guy and gotten killed, but he’d get over it.) Then he tugged with his teeth, only enough to make her breath hitch and her hips twitch. 

He turned to the other breast to repeat the process, his enjoyment marred somewhat by the fact that her skin had the chill of death on it, and not from his icy touch. (If that Maitland bitch hadn’t fed him to a sandworm, if he’d managed to finagle his way out of the waiting room early, if he had just _been there_ . . .) Okay, so he’d enjoy making time with a living Lydia, that didn’t mean his dead Lydia was lacking – because she wasn’t. No, he still wanted her a million ways from Sunday.

He tried to concentrate on giving her a hickey, but he ended up lamenting the fact that it wouldn’t last very long before the unblemished skin of her last living memory reasserted itself.

Sliding his hand lower down her arching back, his fingers encountered a small, ragged indentation. As he absently fingered it, he realized it was the entrance wound to match the bloody splatter on her stomach. And it hit him again viscerally that she had been shot in the back while wearing her wedding dress. Lydia. Shot in back. Wedding dress. His fiancée. And that _bothered_ him.

Her eyes fluttered open as he abruptly paused. When she touched his face inquisitively he gave himself a shake and went back to work with a will, only to stop again a moment later. She groaned at losing the heating caress of his mouth. He suddenly straightened, dragging her upright as she stiffened her arm in surprise and grabbed onto the back of his neck. 

Quirking an eyebrow and trying not to pant, she asked, “What is it?”

“Who did it?” he demanded.

She frowned, narrowing her eyes. Trying to focus on what he was saying was surprisingly difficult. What the hell was he talking about? “Did what?” she finally asked.

He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her, one hand still holding the edge of her skirt. “Shot you! Killed you! …Tried to marry you.”

Her head rattling and the pleasant haze her thoughts had fallen into evaporated, she karate-chopped his elbows and broke his grip. 

He let go of her skirt. 

“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said. She could tell him the back story she’d written for her costume, but it would require heavy modification to fit her life. Each detail (to get technical, each lie) she told him would be one more thing to remember. It was difficult enough keeping what ghosts can and can't do straight. Also, she would feel bad about it. It wasn’t her fault that he’d assumed she was dead, and she hadn’t dispelled that particular delusion, but it wasn’t quite the same thing as deliberately lying to him.

“But-!” he said. He knew it was probably a painful subject, but he had to know!

“But nothing! Do you see these?” she asked, cupping her own breasts dramatically.

His eyes zeroed in. “Yeah…what’s your points – I mean, nipple – I mean point!”

“These will be going away and you won’t see them again if you don’t drop it!” Part of her, a very small part she reassured herself, was violently protesting the thought of never having that talented mouth finish what it started.

He covered her potent distraction with his hands, only to realize that wasn’t working out so well when he was unable to resist massaging them with his palms. Trying to ignore while at the same time savoring the sensation, he fixed her with a glare. What wasn’t she telling him? Why didn’t she want to talk about it? A lot of ghosts wouldn’t shut up about how they died! “Why are you protecting him? Do you love him?!” he demanded.

She gaped at Beetlejuice. Honestly, what a time for his one-track mind to skip onto anything but lechery! Where did he come up with this stuff?! Hadn’t he ever heard that to assume makes an ass out of ‘u,’ never mind me?

Fuck. She did, didn’t she? He couldn’t breathe. He didn’t need to breathe, he usually liked to in order to smoke, but he couldn’t breathe. He’d find the asshole and get rid of ‘em. Permanently. He wasn’t a bio-exorcist for nothing.

“Him _who_?” she shouted. Grabbing Beetlejuice by the shoulders, she tried to shake him, but he was rigidly locked in place. "I am not protecting anybody and I have no idea who you think I'm in love with!"

And suddenly the world was the right way up again and the mysterious constriction around his non-corporeal lungs was gone. Because she obviously didn’t love someone else, she couldn’t, not with the way she was carrying on. What the hell was wrong with him, cornering the hottest bird he’d ever laid eyes on and then wasting time talking? 

He kissed her madly, but she refused to participate no matter how his tongue cajoled hers. But she couldn’t budge his crushing embrace as she shoved and struggled. She couldn’t even knee him like this. 

That stupid little voice had terrible ideas. If she’d been in her right mind she would never have encouraged him. She didn’t want to marry him! She didn’t want anything to do with him! No matter how good he was at kissing. He could just run off with one of those bimbos he’d been ‘practicing’ with, for all she cared. They could have his moldy ass.

But as his mold tickled her cheek and his chapped lips plied her own, the banked warmth in her belly ignited. The musty liquor taste of him was like nothing so much as spirits that burned enough to freeze, and it blazed through her. That stuff’s dangerous, you know.

It was easy, far too easy to let him have what he wanted, when being wanted (and she could tell he wanted it so bad) was going straight to her head. This was not casual, ‘oh look she has boobs’ groping, but a serious study of what made her gasp or tilt her hips or pull his tangled hair. She’d spent her most hormonal teenage years being shunned by boys for being a dark, freaky witch-lookalike, and here was a man who wasn’t frightened of that at all. He seemed to like it. For the moment, the fact that he’d probably make out with a real witch, with warts and twenty cats, slipped from her mind.

Then his zealous hands were fondling her knees and he was kneeling before her with her massive skirt bundled out of the way and when had that happened? He was staring at the scrap of white fabric that no one was ever meant to see with something like fanaticism in his flashing green eyes. He was licking his lips. She snapped her legs shut, catching his nose as he leaned in. 

“Goddammit!” He rubbed the injury with surly indignation at being so, so close…and having her clam up! It was enough to make him tear his hair out!

That was too much! Too far, too fast, what was she thinking?! She pulled her bra back into place, straightening the layers of her dress in an effort to compose herself, looking anywhere but at him.

He let his hands slide down her smooth legs. They shook with the effort of keeping his touch light and unthreatening, and not prying her thighs open and kissing her until she gave in. Making her resent him would hardly get him any in the long run. She didn’t kick him off like he feared she would, although her foot twitched as he ran his thumb over her instep. His hand encircled her entire ankle easily. She was just being shy and virginal rather than trying to drive him over the edge, ‘round the bend or _worse_. Although how anyone could resist his good looks was a mystery…

She was somewhat surprised to find out that she was sitting in midair. Have to sit on his lap, huh? He was such a liar! Nevertheless, she managed to scoot off the invisible ledge and drop to the floor, dislodging his hands from her ticklish feet. 

He let her go, plotting and scheming at sweet talking and offers of back rubs to get her to loosen up. Maybe large amounts of alcohol. He rubbed a hand down his face, stretching out his jaw. He cursed himself for giving her any time at all to think, to decide so far and no further. He damned the overwhelming desire to not only touch but see and smell and taste her all over that left her mouth unoccupied and able to say no…not that she actually did. Hm. But the worst part, the absolute kicker, was that now he’d caught a glimpse, he wanted it all so much more! If his balls got any bluer, he…well, he didn’t know what would happen, but it was damned uncomfortable!

Going briskly to the desk, she dug around in the top drawer where she’d stuck all the paperwork involved in occupying a dorm, such as the room inspection checklist and a packet of rules an inch thick. They’d also given her takeout menus, as if she couldn’t be a college student without the number of the local pizza joint. She could feel his gaze like tar pouring over her back and it made her squirmingly uncomfortable.

At last she found what she was looking for and turned around, holding up the assortment of pamphlets as a makeshift shield. He was still kneeling there where she’d left him, not touching the ground, and um…she glossed over a certain portion of his anatomy even though it was hard – difficult! to ignore. And she was looking at him with newly opened eyes. She saw the pallid translucency of his skin and the dirt encrusting his uncut fingernails, his unshaven dishabille and the mold, the way he could probably stand to lose a few pounds but the fact that he never, ever would because he was dead. How sunken in and dark his eyes were, when at the same time they glowed acid green.

This – this is what she had allowed to touch her. Not really what you’d call a man at all anymore, but a ghost, a poltergeist. He wasn’t nice and he wasn’t clean cut. Her parents (all five of them) would never approve. Somehow, that made it all the more satisfying. She had already defied every authority in her life just to call him, and it seemed like...he might just stick around. So if she was going to do this rebellion thing, she might as well do it right. She’d have to search far and wide to find another guy that upset everybody that much.

She gestured with her left hand, fanning out the stack of coupons and glossy ads. “Pizza, pizza, pizza, pizza,” she said, ticking off the options. “Or Italian?” She gestured with the single folded piece of paper in her right hand.

“Lyyyyydiaaaaa…” he crooned, and it was a truly terrible thing to hear. “Come over here.”

“None of those?” she said lightly. She thought there was another…oh, right! She’d left it taped to the door, intending to bring it in later. Taking the long way, detouring around piles of boxes and ignoring his irritated snort, she unlocked the door and pulled it open far enough to grab the menu.

The girls across the hallway were still moving in. Her hand stilled, grabbing onto the painted metal of the door. They had just started moving in when she had finished bringing up all her stuff. Holy shit! They couldn’t have been in the Neitherworld for more than an hour! Somehow, her godparents had gotten it all wrong. They must have actually been waiting for three whole months in that room, instead of what seemed like forever but was probably a day or two.

The redhead noticed she was gawking and spared her a harassed wave. Lydia pasted a smile on her face and waved back mechanically.

Snatching down the takeout menu, she pushed the door closed, locked it again, and sank back against it. Her mind was racing a million miles a minute. Which may be why it seemed like she didn’t notice Beetlejuice sneaking up behind her. As he moved in for the kill, she shoved the folded paper up between them, blocking his lip access. “Chinese?” she asked.

“Fine!” He threw up his arms and rolled his eyes. “That’s fucking great! I like egg rolls, dammit!”

Through half-mast eyelashes she considered him. Her toes were still kind of cold. And if he hadn’t noticed her heartbeat pounding practically right under his ear…. “‘Allow 45 minutes for delivery,’” she read off the back of the menu. “I wonder what we could possibly do to pass the time?”

He paused. Blinked. “Got a phone around here, babes?” he asked, leering at her from where he was suddenly lounging against the door next to her.

The hand set was duly extracted from the depths of a cardboard box and plugged in, her new address looked up – 

“Ya don’t even know yer own damn address?” 

“Oh, shut up. I was in the middle of moving in, as you can see.”

“So…this all your stuff?”

– Beetlejuice prevented from dumping everything on the floor, but not before he found the contents of her underwear drawer –

“Why couldn’t ya’ve been wearing this?”

“It’s black!”

“So?”

“It would show through!”

“So?”

– the actual order haggled over –

“You can’t get Szechuan Chicken, I’m getting Szechuan Chicken!”

“We can both get Szechuan Chicken!”

“How will we tell whose is whose?!”

“The one you’re holding in your hand is yours!”

– and the call made.

He slammed the phone back in its cradle and turned to her expectantly. Before he could say anything or arrange things to his liking (which wouldn’t necessarily include her liking), she tripped him over the room’s only chair and plunked herself on his lap when he fell into the seat, careful to avoid his not-so-little problem. “I just have this one rule,” she said.

A silly grin overtaking his shock, he nodded and said, “Yeah!” without really listening.

“Nothing below the waist.” She redirected his grasping hands, aimed towards the horizontal tango, to positions more suitable to a waltz.

“Wait, what?! Come on!”

“What was that? You’d rather watch me unpack?”

“…Is this rule, by any chance, gravity-oriented?”

“ _No._ It is me-oriented. You can’t flip me upside down and claim that that’s not below the waist anymore.”

“Dammit!”


	7. In Which They Make It

PREVIOUSLY:

He slammed the phone back in its cradle and turned to her expectantly. Before he could say anything or arrange things to his liking (which wouldn’t necessarily include her liking), she tripped him over the room’s only chair and plunked herself on his lap when he fell into the seat, careful to avoid his not-so-little problem. “I just have this one rule,” she said.

A silly grin overtaking his shock, he nodded and said, “Yeah!” without really listening.

“Nothing below the waist.” She redirected his grasping hands, aimed towards the horizontal tango, to positions more suitable to a waltz.

“Wait, what?! Come on!”

“What was that? You’d rather watch me unpack?”

“…Is this rule, by any chance, gravity-oriented?”

“No. It is me-oriented. You can’t flip me upside down and claim that that’s not below the waist anymore.”

“Dammit!”

AND NOW, ON WITH THE STORY!

 

Chapter Seven: In Which They Make It

 

“Yes!” Lydia shouted. “Alright!”

Smirking victoriously, Beetlejuice grabbed her ass and crowed, “I knew you’d see reason!”

Not surprisingly, her rule of ‘Nothing Below the Waist’ was a bone of contention between them that he was worrying at like a hound dog. Mere begging and pleading had not swayed her, and his puppy dog eyes made her go ‘Ew!’ 

He’d resorted to a tactic near and dear to his heart: waiting until she was preoccupied and half-naked to ask. But she was too canny for that. ‘Do you like this?’ ‘Yeah.’ ‘Like it like that?’ ‘Mmhm.’ ‘Like for me to go down on you?’ ‘…No!’ 

However, negotiation had worked. Or as Lydia would put it, whining so much she couldn’t take it anymore, especially since it took his mouth away from other, more pleasant activities. So when he’d said, ‘Can’t I just, y’know, touch your legs a little? Gimme a fucking break, here!’ she jumped at the chance to try to mollify him without sacrificing the spirit of the rule, which was no actual sex of any kind.

At the feel of his hands on her ass her eyes popped open and she sat up from where she had been languidly floating half under him. The chair had been abandoned about five seconds after they started making out. “That is not my legs,” she said.

“Says who?” he retorted brilliantly.

“Me!”

He moved his hands three inches lower. “What about here?”

She supposed that was about a third leg, but before she could answer there was a loud honk from outside. “That’s probably the delivery guy.”

“I’ll get it!” He leapt to his feet and started to sink through the floor, leaving her to fall on her rear.

She reached out and grabbed at his arm. Her hand went straight through, but there was something there, like an itch in her brain, that she managed to latch onto to haul him back up. “Aren’t you forgetting something?”

He stared at her blankly.

“The money?”

“Oh, yeah, right! The money. ‘Cause the dead are so well known for paying their bills.” He rolled his eyes.

“Stuff a sock in the sarcasm and just take it, ok?” Scooping up the pile of cash near the phone, set out for just this purpose, she took his hand and shoved it in before pushing him through the floor.

He groaned and started picking bills out of his palm as he drifted down through the building, making several people shiver and shorting out a refrigerator he passed through. “Damn pushy broad…” 

Lydia waited a second to make sure he was gone and then made a frantic dash to the bathroom down the hall, ignoring the strange looks her dress got. 

The worst thing about pretending to be a ghost, she thought as she washed her hands, was that there was no polite way to excuse yourself for a moment alone. What was she supposed to say, I need to haunt people for a bit? He’d probably offer to help, choosing precisely the wrong time to be chivalrous, or at least leaping at the opportunity to spread chaos.

Relieved as she was to find that he was not back yet on her return to her dorm, she also worried about what was taking him so long.

Meanwhile, Beetlejuice had reached street level and snuck up to the delivery boy’s car. He invisibly spirited all the bags from the backseat of the fancy drop-top with the triangular plastic sign stuck on top and was headed back with the takeout bobbing along behind him like ducks, when a thought occurred to him. What Lyds didn’t know, couldn’t come back to bite him in the ass. And he wasn’t ever going to tell her.

A snaggle-toothed grin stretching his face, he turned back to the mohawked delivery boy, who was tapping his foot along to his walkman and snapping his gum as he checked his watch.

Up in the dorm Lydia was taking the opportunity to change into the most hideous pair of granny panties she owned in the hope that they might, if not turn off, then dial down a certain someone’s libido. Certainly they would give Lydia the fortitude to keep saying no. No way was she letting anyone ever see her in these! She was convinced they made her practically immortal, because she refused to be caught dead in them. She’d got them half on when she heard the girlish shrieking and the insistent honk of a car alarm, but she resisted going to look as she struggled to get the horrifying support underwear the rest of the way on and her dress adjusted before Beej floated through the wall.

He flung out his arms, shouting, “Hi honey, I’m hoooooome! And I brought dinner!” The bags of takeout floated in and dropped to the floor.

She blinked and sighed. “You – that’s way more than we ordered. What the hell are we supposed to do with it all?”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, ya see, it’s like this-“

“No. I really don’t want to know. Either your excuses, or what actually happened. I just don’t want to know.” She sat down and grabbed a bag. “Let’s just eat, ok?”

He blinked. “Hell, that’s fine with me.” Shrugging, he sat down too, although he missed the floor by a few inches. “Where’s the Szechuan Chicken?”

This seemingly innocent question was, in fact, the start of a half-hour-long search through the takeout bags, which were only labeled with order numbers assigned according to some arcane technique known only to Chinese restaurant employees. Perhaps they consulted fortune cookies, which would explain both the series of random two digit clusters and the one that said only, ‘Beware of shrimp today,’ which had made Beetlejuice snicker rather loudly.

There was much taste-testing and questions requiring deep thought, such as, “This is Mu Shu, alright, but Mu Shu what?” and, “If you eat two fortune cookies, and they had conflicting predictions, which one comes true? Or, if they’re totally unrelated, if you eat the cookies at the same time, do both of the predictions come true at the same time?” By the time they actually found their own order, they were reluctant to actually eat it.

Lydia lazily opened the very last brown paper bag and peeked inside. Three white cartons, wax paper thing of eggrolls. “Here, Beej, I’m pretty sure this is the double Szechuan Chicken.” She took out one of the cartons oozing brownish sauce and thrust it in his general direction. Letting herself fall flat to the floor, she proceeded to hug her stomach with her other arm. “Oof.”

“Don’t ya want it? You’re the one that ordered it.” Beetlejuice didn’t even glance at it as he waved it back at her before patting his paunch contentedly, laying prostrate in the air.

“I seriously couldn’t eat another bite. I’m stuffed. And you ordered it too.”

A mischievous glint sparked up in his eyes as he turned toward her. “Stuffed, huh? I—“

“Don’t even dare to finish that sentence. Seriously. I’m not so full that I won’t get up and hit you. Or just throw something at you.” She groaned. 

“Hey, is that a cockroach?” he said brightly.

“Change the subject why don’t you….” She rolled her eyes and tilted her head to the side to look where he was pointing. 

A huge beetle was moseying across the beige carpet barely a foot away from her face. 

She shrieked and scuttled backwards into Beetlejuice, who was now avidly leaning forward. “It’s a cockroach!” she whispered forcefully, modulating her tone with extreme effort. Bringing the neighbors running because of a bug was silly. 

She knew that keeping any building pest-free was an iffy prospect, but did her dorm really have to be infested with…with…! She didn’t give a damn about a lot of different insects. Ladybugs and moths were alright in her book and crickets and flies were mostly annoying because of the noise, but cockroaches were just gross.

Time seemed to stretch like taffy as she watched in gaping horror as his molding hand reached out past her. He grabbed the cockroach up and ate it in two chomping bites, with all signs of evident enjoyment. He even licked his fingers afterwards and let out a belch. 

She was staring and she knew she was staring, but she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t even make herself blink, her eyes were fixated on his mouth. His dirty, dirty mouth. That had done things to her. And had just eaten a bug! She wondered why she was so surprised by that, given that she’d seen him do it before, but the memory of him chomping on the aphids crawling around on the model seemed to have been one she’d willfully suppressed. Otherwise she never would have let him stick his tongue _there_! A shudder worked its way down her spine, from the base of her neck to her tailbone.

“Whazza matter, honey?” he said, perfectly oblivious.

“I thought you were full,” Lydia managed to say.

“Aw, I’m sorry, did you want some?” he sing-songed and playfully went for a kiss.

She recoiled desperately, throwing out, “Hey, what’s the time? Don’t we have somewhere to be?”

Beetlejuice thankfully paused in his efforts to plant one on her to nonchalantly check his timepieces and pronounce, without even a twitch, “We got all the time in the world, babes.”

“Lemme see that,” she said, reaching for his arm.

He tried to twist away while at the same time entangle her in his arms, which resulted in him tying himself up in knots. That made it easy for her to get his arm in a lock and pull up his sleeve.

“Holy --! It’s three o’clock already. Beej, we’re gonna be late!” She dragged him up, marched him over to the door and demanded, “Do that portal thing you do.” 

As she looked at him expectantly, he slowly untangled himself and drawled, “Maybe I will, maybe I won’t.”

“Beej!” She crossed her arms. “We have an appointment!”

He somehow insinuated his arms through hers so that they were holding onto each other and gave her the ol’ bedroom eyes trick, the dark pits under his brows smoldering with green fire. “We don’t need no counselor to get busy, baby-doll.” But she managed to block the incoming kiss with her hand sprawled over his face and shoving his chin back. He scowled. 

“Don’t you want to marry me?” she said, making her eyes wide and pouting at him. Time was of the essence. Normal tactics wouldn’t cut it.

He mumbled, “Sure,” through lips smashed up against her palm. “But we can just see a preacher—“

“Do you want to touch my ass?” she interrupted.

He nodded as far as her grip on his face allowed.

“Then get us to the marriage counselor on time!”

 

\--SCENE BREAK--

 

Lydia fussed with her tousled everything and tried to calm down. They stood in front of a prosaic door with a frosted glass window and brass name tag inscribed with ‘Heidi, Counselor Senior Rank, Special Circumstances, Department of Marital Relations.’ She didn’t remember precisely how they had gotten here in nearly the blink of an eye, but she didn’t think she wanted to either. Beetlejuice was sulking off to her left and had his hand on her backside. She had promised after all. She would just have to block sight of his arm with her body.

Taking one last deep breath, she knocked and swung open the door.

The lady at the desk looked up irritably and snapped, “What is it? I’m on my…Lydia? Is that you?” She stood up and moved towards them, holding out her arms and smiling. “Lydia!”

Lydia’s jaw dropped and Beej’s hand on her ass actually froze in place. “G-grandma?”


	8. /9: The Appointment

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry folks, I'm sort of experimenting with sticking chapters together to see if it flows better, so the next chapter is writing that hasn't been posted here before.

PREVIOUSLY:

Lydia fussed with her tousled everything and tried to calm down. They stood in front of a prosaic door with a frosted glass window and brass name tag inscribed with ‘Heidi, Counselor Senior Rank, Special Circumstances, Department of Marital Relations.’ She didn’t remember precisely how they had gotten here in nearly the blink of an eye, but she didn’t think she wanted to either. Beetlejuice was sulking off to her left and had his hand on her backside. She had promised after all. She would just have to block sight of his arm with her body.

Taking one last deep breath, she knocked and swung open the door.

The lady at the desk looked up irritably and snapped, “What is it? I’m on my…Lydia? Is that you?” She stood up and moved towards them, holding out her arms and smiling. “Lydia!”

Lydia’s jaw dropped and Beej’s hand on her ass actually froze in place. “G-grandma?”

AND NOW, ON WITH THE STORY!  
.

Chapter Eight/Nine: The Appointment  
.

Bewildered, Lydia accepted a hug from her grandmother, a statuesque woman in a retro pencil skirt and sweater set with very long black hair only a little streaked with grey. Her grandmother that she would have sworn was alive this morning! 

Well, it wasn’t like they kept in contact, really, but she’d gotten a birthday card this year like usual. It had had a white cake with black candles on the front. Inside was a pop up skeleton that danced when you flapped the card, with a banner blaring ‘Happy Death-Day!’ with ‘death’ crossed out and ‘birth’ scribbled in above. She’d quite enjoyed it and the twenty five dollar check folded into an accordion and taped to the skeleton’s hands. Grandma’s cards always were a little…strange…. 

Someone would have told Lydia if she’d died, certainly? After the estrangement from his first wife, Dad had avoided his first mother-in-law assiduously, but he still would have attended her funeral, right? She couldn’t nag him if she was dead.

Just as they gave each other a squeeze (the universal signal that the hug should end), Beetlejuice clamped them both together again, shouting, “Group hug!” Then he pried Lydia away from where she’d gotten stuck on her grandmother’s dangly bat earrings, said, “Scuze us for a minute,” and herded her back out into the hallway.

“You didn’t tell me your granny is Cyanide Heidi!” he hissed at her. 

“Well, you never asked, either. …Cyanide?”

“The most feared necromancer for the last hundred and fifty years!”

Lydia peered around him into the office and said, “She’s knitting a fuzzy orange jack-o-lantern sweater.” She sidestepped him to go back into the office. She’d always felt that her (biological) parents were hiding something about her grandmother, and she was going to find out what.

He blocked her. “She could knit _you_ into a sweater!”

“She let me call her ‘Gamma Nighty’ until I was six. I think we’ll be safe.” Lydia ducked under his arm and inside before he could stop her.

“Argh!” Beetlejuice slapped his hand to his forehead and dragged it down his face. He debated with himself for a moment about just making tracks and ditching Lyds. It was her granny after all, she’d be fine. Never mind that those types tended to keep their deceased loved ones trapped in urns on the mantel. Rumor had it that Cyanide Heidi had even managed to take down one of the royal family, for a minute or two. And Lyds – soft Lydia, sweet Lydia, Lydia of the fantastic ass – seemed to have no fuckin’ clue. He had plans for that ass that he wasn’t gonna let no jumped-up bone-conjuror interfere in! With a grunt of frustration he followed her in.

“It’s so nice of you to drop by,” the dangerous necromancer was saying as she and Lydia settled into the chairs sitting in front of the desk. Two were against one wall while one sat against the other. The office was so cramped that their knees bumped together when they sat, and the desk had been crumpled a little to get it to fit in. “And with your first minion!” she exclaimed, “I’m-“

Lydia tried to interject. “He’s not-“

Heidi, however, was on a roll. “-so proud of you. I was worried that you’d follow in your mother’s footsteps. She always said she just wanted to be normal, the poor dear, but what is normal anyway?”

Beetlejuice sat down, bumping into everyone’s knees, and immediately started tapping his fingers uneasily against his thighs. With some minor glee he took up as much space as possible, crowding Lydia into the desk.

Heidi winked at Lydia and continued, barely pausing for breath. “And what a catch! I’m sure I never had a poltergeist when I was just starting out as a young girl. I want to hear all about it!”

Lydia waited for a moment to be sure that her grandmother was finished and it was safe to talk. “Actually, he’s not my minion,” she began.

Beetlejuice snorted. Like he would ever swan around catering to the whim of some slip of a girl, let a dame put a leash on him and order him to come to heel like a damn dog! There was a perfectly good explanation for any evidence to the contrary that might happen to involve his fiancée, right?

“This is Bee -- B.J., my fiancé.” She took his hand and gave a valiant attempt at a smile. “Right, honey?” She looked at him expectantly. Then she jostled his arm. 

“Huh?” he said, snapping out of his increasingly dark musings.

“I said: Right, honey?”

“Oh. Yeah. Right.”

“How romantic!” Heidi said. “I can just see how it must have happened. Of course, you set out to Bind something small for your first try, maybe a twice-dead cat, and you summoned him by accident. Don’t worry, it takes practice to aim summoning portals with any accuracy, you should hear about the thing your cousin Permelia dragged out of the pits because she mumbled a bit. But then by the time you realized it, he’d overpowered you. Looking deep into your eyes, he realized that he could never harm such a beautiful lady! So he let you go. But he couldn’t stop thinking about you once you banished him, and snuck back across to see you. That’s how you met, isn’t it? I just know it is!”

Lydia blinked. “Um, not exactly, Grandma.” 

Heidi’s eerily ageless face fell.

Lydia squirmed a bit at the loss of that dreamy expression. “But…kind of?” she finally said. It wasn’t precisely a lie.

Heidi perked up again. “Tell me all about it!”

“Well!” Beetlejuice said with exaggerated relish, leaning forward conspiratorially. Then he launched into a protracted rendition of his stint of bio-exorcism in Winter River, which painted the Maitlands as sneering villains who had tricked him into doing their dirty work, scaring off the living occupants of the house. In this fable Lydia wore short skirts a lot and fell madly in love with the handsome poltergeist that tried to frighten her but couldn’t. She gladly agreed to marry him, leading to Barbara’s treachery when she crashed their beautiful wedding. He went into loving detail about the dress he’d made for her, the tux he’d worn, and the fact that her parents were going to be their witnesses and could hardly drag themselves away.

The real Lydia wanted to groan, roll her eyes, and say that’s not how it happened, but how could she disappoint her grandma with the sordid truth? 

He concluded the fanciful tale with, “And then I got eaten by a sandworm.”

“Oh no!” exclaimed Heidi.

“Oh yes!” chortled Beetlejuice, delighting in a receptive audience.

“But how did you survive?”

“Well,” he prevaricated, tugging at his open collar as if it was suddenly too tight. “The usual, y’know, didn’t actually get a good grip on me, the ole one two.”

“Is that so?” Heidi said lightly and smiled, leaning back in her seat. “Now, B.J., was it?”

“Yeah sure, Grams. Can I call you Grams?”

“Of course, Betelgeuse.” 

Something in the way she said his name, a half-heard echo that prickled on the back of Lydia’s neck, made her absolutely sure that her grandmother was not using the phonetic epithet ‘Beetlejuice,’ although the syllables were similar. Should have been identical, but somehow they weren’t.

Beetlejuice jumped to his feet, sputtering.

“Sit down,” Heidi said in that same unsettling voice that resonated in ways that you didn’t hear with your ears.

He sat.

“Shut up,” Heidi said.

His mouth slammed shut.

“Now, Lydia,” Heidi said, once again all pleasant affability. “Your father called me up four years ago in hysterics, demanding to know if I was the kind of witch who could exorcise a house, so I know all about that side of the story. B.J. has just enlightened me as to his feelings on the matter. Why don’t you tell me the truth?”

“All about it?” Lydia slumped down in the chair.

Heidi nodded. “Allllllll about it.”

So Lydia began her own story. She started with the Maitlands -- how they had lived, how they had died, and how they had returned to what was left of their lives afterward. Namely their house.

Beside her Beetlejuice began to peel slivers of wood off the armrests where his arms seemed to be stuck down, the scritch-scratch adding to the harsh grinding noise that made Lydia’s own teeth wince in sympathy.

Next Lydia outlined how she, Dad, and Delia had moved in. She attempted to explain Delia, or failing that, at least how she had completely remodeled the house, or failing that because sometimes words just weren’t enough, simply explain how angry and upset the Maitlands had been.

On and on the details poured out from the recesses of her mind where she had crammed them down, never talked about, the whole episode deliberately ignored even after the Maitlands became an accepted part of the family. Other things came out too: How much she had resented Delia, how disappointed and angry she had been at her father, and how desperately unhappy she had been. Things that Lydia had never planned to discuss with anyone. Heidi’s silence seemed to actively draw the words out. Some kind of counseling trick?

Increasingly uneasy, Lydia forced herself to continue, realizing that this was likely the only chance she would ever have to tell Beetlejuice why she’d let him get eaten by a sandworm when he could do nothing but sit and listen to her. So now, speaking as much to him as to her grandmother, she went deeper. How she had felt no choice but to agree to any bargain with the Maitlands actually disintegrating before her eyes. How he had both frightened and exhilarated her with the carnival routine that punted Maxie Dean and his utterly obnoxious wife out of the house. The easy, careless way he saved her friends, who had become more like parents to her than her own flesh and blood. 

She highlighted in intricate and graphic terms how the exhilaration had fled and left only terror in its wake as he proceeded to treat her with the same cavalier disregard he’d shown tossing people through the roof headfirst. She had thought that the Deans were dead and her family was next. She admitted to panicking, not knowing what he would do when he was truly free, how he would treat her in the face of what he had already done, or if she would live out the night.

The office felt much too quiet when she was done. Beetlejuice sat corpse-still, not breathing, staring intently at her with his inhuman eyes glowing like opaque jade lamps.

“Oh, honey,” Heidi broke the effect of the silence. “If you were the powerless girl they let you grow up believing you were, you weren’t even close to being afraid enough of what he could do.” She pulled her granddaughter into her arms for a quick hug and then held Lydia out, hands on her shoulders. “However, you’ve got necromancy in your blood. And I want you to understand the effect that had on the situation. Of course the Maitlands, righteously angry ghosts, would instead become what you most needed them to be – surrogate parents. Of course a powerful, malevolent spirit like B.J. would fixate on you – dark power knows itself.”

“What are you saying?” Lydia asked, trying and failing to move away. The grip on her shoulders was not tight, but it was completely immovable. “That it’s my fault he demanded I marry him?”

“It’s not something you could control without having been taught, so no. It was not your fault.” With a slight shake, having emphasized the point she wanted to make, Heidi let go and sat back. “Look on the bright side! You’ve managed to completely enthrall him now.”

Stunned, Lydia’s eyes swiveled without any conscious thought towards the poltergeist sitting so unnaturally still beside her. His stare had not wavered one iota. She hadn’t thought he was capable of being still that long.

A knock on the door presaged it creaking open. Someone was saying, “Hello? We’re here for our appointment…?”

Heidi said, “Can’t you see I’ve got company?” Then she went out in the corridor to deal with the newly arrived couple. From the muffled sounds that made it through the door, there was an explosive argument as she tried to shoo them away and they battled desperately to avoid getting stuck in line for another century. Someone’s ancestors were compared to geraniums.

Lydia could only hear Beetlejuice’s rough voice growling, “So you think you’ve got me under thrall?”

Forcefully peeling her eyes away from Beetlejuice’s piercing stare, Lydia stumbled to her feet. She had to catch her balance leaning against the wall as the building shook, smoke billowing under the door and shrieks filling the hallway outside as the argument over appointment times escalated. Normally she would have shrugged off the disorientation easily, but she already felt like the floor of reality had been yanked out from under her feet.

“Are you?” she burst out, slumped against the wall. “Is that what all this has been about?” She threw out her arms in a sweeping gesture that managed to indicate ‘all this’ was on a level with life, the universe, and everything rather than the small office's kitschy contents.

Sardonically, Beetlejuice slowly peeled his arms away from the chair and laboriously lit a cigarette by hand with affected nonchalance. “You think you’re that good, babes?” He then blew smoke at her face.

The coughing and hacking that ensued on her part broke through some of the hysteria. Finally, swallowing dryly and hating any vulnerability that asking again showed, she demanded, “Have I enthralled you?”

He sneered and hauled her towards him by the skirt, the only thing he could reach at this angle. She heard a loud rip as she fell awkwardly into his clutches, but it didn’t register until she felt his clammy hand maneuvering her bare thigh over the armrest. The other hand holding the cig between two fingers grasped the back of her neck to hold her in place. Her eyes wide and her heart thundering in abject terror that he might slide one hand a little too far and discover her hideous underwear, she had about a millisecond to worry that the other hand would set her hair on fire. Then his lips sealed around hers.

It was not a kiss.

It was a ravishment. He sucked the air out of her lungs and then he started working on her soul. Lightning flashed and her heart stuttered before static shocks crawled from her mouth to her toes, rustling like ancient books flapping their pages over her skin. Her vision had gone black and sparks fizzled behind her eyes by the time he let her lips go. As if that had been the signal, she then passed out.

Swimming towards consciousness, Lydia noticed the sea of stars seemed to dance in a rhythm that she vaguely recognized as someone talking. It was all nonsense: swear, cuss, inventive way of shaming a goat with an octopus, worse swearing, not dead you could have died! Also she might have heard, 'My stupid little dumbass sugar baby candy bottom,' but it seemed unlikely.

When she came to with a start, he’d managed to stand and pin her against the wall. The look of abject relief on his face was replaced so quickly with fury that she wasn’t sure she had seen it. Her ribs ached and her lips felt raw, but on the whole she felt surprisingly energetic.

He grabbed her chin and shook her head lightly. “Ya really don’t know nothin’, do ya Lyds?” he gritted out. “Two way street here – sign of a complete amateur. Only I can drain you like a goddamned shot while you’re still sipping on a Big Gulp.”

She knew he had to be transcendently angry, because he didn’t bother to emphasize the innuendo even though their positions presented what would normally be overwhelming temptation. She shoved him away and he actually let her, as he took a step back to loom over her with his hands planted on the wall hemming her in. Any hope that it wasn’t really true died a gasping death, and her heart broke…just a little. Only a tiny crack, not even worth mentioning. She’d never thought he liked her or anything silly like that…had she?

“It wasn’t,” Lydia began haltingly. “I never intended – I didn’t mean to!”

“Oh well, you didn’t _mean_ to,” Beetlejuice began in a voice that was entirely too calm and descended into venom-dipped-daggers-made-of-scorpion-tails territory. “That makes it all a-okay!”

“Then we’ll just call the whole thing off!” she retorted desperately.

“What? !” he shouted, straightening abruptly. “You-“

He was interrupted by the office door opening and Heidi strolling back in shaking a snow globe. The hallway behind her was empty. “So sorry about that,” she said. “I think a little vacation will cool their heads.” The snow globe was set on a shelf running around the room just under the ceiling, among a clutter of other similar knickknacks. Inside the globe two tiny figures were frozen in a pose of cringing horror, glitter snow piling up around their heads. Behind them was a sign emblazoned with a cheery ‘Aspen Skiing’ and a diabolically grinning snowman mascot.

Lydia edged around Beetlejuice towards the door. “Um, if you need to do your job-“

“No, no! Family comes first,” Heidi protested, nudging them back into their chairs by the elbows. “Besides, what’s the Administration going to do? Give me even more community service? I only put up with it as it is because I like playing matchmaker.”

Glancing from the snow globe to her grandmother, Lydia made an intuitive leap. “So being a counselor is a p-“

“Punishment? Correct,” Heidi said, sitting down herself.

“What did you do in the first place?”

“Pffft.” Heidi waved away her concern. “Honestly, nothing much. But apparently they frown on famous people taking a little stroll topside. How was I supposed to know Elvis was still so popular?”

Startled, Beetlejuice’s knotted brow twitched and his pinched frown unfurled. “That was you?” he snorted.

“I heard about how they tried to pin it on you at first. Made a historic precedent, the only time you ever got off the hook by actually being innocent of the crime and not on a technicality, wasn’t it?” Heidi propped her chin on her fist and smiled.

His lips quirked back in a smirk that was nearly as nasty as that smile. “Nah. Me and the Chief got our regular poker ‘n’ beer night. I just make him change out of those ridiculously shiny jumpsuits. He can fit a whole deck of cards up each sleeve.” He demonstrated by tweaking his cuff links, unleashing an avalanche of playing cards from at least ten different decks, including Tarot. Lydia recognized the Fool as it fluttered by.

“Hm.” Heidi attempted a severe look, but a twinkle in her eyes gave away her amusement. She turned to Lydia and said, “Darling, it’s been lovely chatting, but my grandmotherly intuition tells me you didn’t come here just to catch up.”

“Well, no…” Lydia trailed off, sneaking a glance at Beetlejuice from the corner of her eye. He was sitting there with his hands laced together in his lap looking calm and, and chipper, of all things. Lydia was deeply disturbed by this. He had _something_ up his sleeve, and it sure as hell wasn’t cards.

“Don’t tell me…?” Heidi clapped her hands gleefully. “You want help planning your wedding!” 

That was in fact the reason they had made an appointment in the first place, and by the time Lydia had rallied herself and found a way to gently (in order to spare her grandmother’s feelings and also because no one wants to be a snow globe figurine) explain that they changed their mind, Heidi was on a roll. 

“Oh, of course I’ll help, you don’t even have to ask! There’s so much to do! Now first things first, have you two set a date yet?”

“No,” Lydia said at the same time Beetlejuice said, “Yes.” As she shot a surprised look at him, he put an arm around her shoulders and squished her to his side, taking her hand in his. “We were thinking today,” he explained to Heidi as Lydia tried to pry herself free, “But pookie here’s feeling embarrassed about how eager she is for the honeymoon, know what I mean?”

Cringing, Lydia hardly had time to say, “I –“

“Oh no, that won’t do at all.” Heidi tsked. “There would be no time for anyone to respond to the invitations! I’m sure all of Lydia’s cousins and their families, and my brothers and sisters, not to mention the Deetz side of the family, oh, and Pa will certainly want to be there, and then there’s-“ The list went on. And on and on.

By the time they escaped her grandmother’s wedding-mad clutches, Lydia and Beetlejuice had been subjected to a rigorous interrogation about every single person they had ever met in their entire lives and/or existences who might possibly be invited. The most auspicious dates for weddings had been debated with the intensity of a life and death battle. Beetlejuice had set his tent staunchly in the camp of the nearest star alignment, which happened to be only two weeks away, and had won the day by sheer grit and determination and also by pouting about the alignment involving his namesake. They had been grilled about color choices. Lydia had been highly disgruntled that Heidi wouldn’t let her get away with choosing “black and a different black” but she was mollified when Beetlejuice’s choice of “maroon and powder blue” was vetoed also. They’d been given the third degree over flowers, put on the rack over the style of invitations, gone through the wringer picking a location, and then told to come back tomorrow after they had perused a stack of magazines and brochures that towered over both of them.

Laden down with their homework, they waded to the door through shin-deep playing cards. As soon as the door shut behind them Lydia heard the slippery sound of hundreds of glossy pages being hurled to the floor, shortly followed by the sight of Beetlejuice knocking her own vision-obstructing stack out of her hands. Once more they were in the beige confines of her dorm room, although Beetlejuice looked an awful lot like he wanted to paint the walls red.


	9. )10: A Temper Is a Terrible Thing to Waste

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: Some non-consensual licking, mild bondage, and suggestive themes
> 
> Walking the line between Beej being a big jerk and Beej being a big unforgivable jerk is really difficult. If you personally feel uncomfortable with that kind of plot development I think you could probably skip this chapter and here's a summary for you: Beetlejuice acts pretty much like a psychopathic poltergeist and makes everyone, including himself, feel bad.

PREVIOUSLY:

Laden down with their homework, they waded to the door through shin-deep playing cards. As soon as the door shut behind them Lydia heard the slippery sound of hundreds of glossy pages being hurled to the floor, shortly followed by the sight of Beetlejuice knocking her own vision-obstructing stack out of her hands. Once more they were in the beige confines of her dorm room, although Beetlejuice looked an awful lot like he wanted to paint the walls red. 

AND NOW, ON WITH THE STORY!  
.

Chapter Ten: A Temper Is a Terrible Thing to Waste  
.

“D’ya know what happens to liars, Lydia?” he asked conversationally as the scattered magazines and pamphlets burst into green flames.

The sheer heat sent Lydia scrambling backwards while scrabbling at her long train. She didn’t dare look down to see if her dress was on fire. She had the unsettling feeling he would see that as a sign of weakness and – do what exactly? Pounce on her? 

The flickering light threw one half of his face then another into sharp relief, bringing out the harsh lines of his skull under the shallow pretense of his ghostly skin. He stalked forward.

“We can talk about this calmly and rationally and – and without setting anything else on fire,” she managed to say firmly. Her back hit the wall.

“There’s just a few teeny weeny, itsy bitsy _problems_ with that,” he said, holding up his pinched together thumb and forefinger. Lydia nearly jumped out of her skin as his voice spoke directly in her ear, with his lips twisted in a smirk a few feet away. “You’re not calm.” He took that last step forward and clamped his hands on her waist, dropping his forehead down to rest on hers. His dark eye sockets bore down until all she saw was the acid glow of his green irises, swirling gently around black hole pupils. “And I’m not rational!” He picked her up and lazily tossed her across the room.

Shrieking, Lydia bounced off the bare mattress on top of the loft bed. She nearly went over the side before something grabbed her wrist and anchored it to the wooden rail. A slither of leather and the glint of a buckle was the only warning before her other arm was snapped up and belted to the rail. Desperately, Lydia pulled herself up to get the buckles in range of her teeth – if she could only undo them before – but the cool slide of shaped metal snaked under her tangled skirt and around her ankles, yanking her back down.

Beetlejuice slowly rose over the side of the bed wearing puke green surgical scrubs liberally spattered with viscous black fluid. He situated the cap more firmly on his wild hair, making more of it stick out the sides. He snapped on dirty, tattered gloves and raised a twisted eyebrow at her. “Let’s play doctor!” he said.

“Let’s not, and say we did,” Lydia quipped faintly, trying to tug furtively on her bonds.

“Now, now, I’m an expert on mortal wounds. And this one you got here looks very serious indeed.” He bent in close and went ‘hmmmm.’

“Why are you doing this?” She tugged harder.

He straightened and shook his head. “I’m afraid, Miss Deetz, you have an acute case of prosthesis. There’s only one cure. Amputation!” Green flames tinged with orange surged up behind him as he cackled.

Furtive went out the window and she struggled with all her skinny Goth might. There was obviously no use reasoning with him. She had no idea how to use any necromantic powers against him or even what most of them might be. However, she only had to say his name, and he would be put Back. It was risky, but it was a chance. The ceiling was already hazy with smoke and it was becoming difficult to breathe.

“Nurse!” he roared, “My scalpel!” He held out his hand imperiously.

Lydia automatically looked to the left and there Beetlejuice was, in a striped nurse costume and pigtails. He handed over a wickedly gleaming scalpel with a teehee.

Lydia’s eyes darted to the right and there he was in the scrubs. He took one look at the scalpel and tossed it over his shoulder, where it stuck quivering in the opposite wall. “Machete!”

“Machete!” he answered, slapping the handle in his open palm.

Inspecting the edge on his thumb, he grunted and tossed that over his shoulder too, knocking the scalpel out of the wall. “Chainsaw!” he shouted while pulling on complicated brass goggles.

“Chainsaw!” he chirped to himself and pulled out a rusty three-foot long monster with the ‘Acme’ logo just barely visible under suspicious stains.

He fiddled with the ignition, cursing to himself and trying to get it started. She wasn’t going to get a better chance. “Beetlejui-!” A belt cinched itself over her mouth.

He tsked and shook a finger at her. “Don’t you want to get better, Miss Deetz?”

“Mmph!” She tried pleading with her eyes.

He finally got the chainsaw going.

She tried sticking her chest out and wiggled one leg out of the rip in her skirt. He wouldn’t really cut her in half, right?

He revved the chainsaw, the unholy ruckus deafening over the crackling of the flames below.

It would be stupid of him to kill her, right? Marrying a corpse wouldn’t net him his green card. He _wouldn’t_. Although, he had been going to marry ghost-Lydia and maybe he thought they’d just get back together or something and oh god - 

The whirring blade lifted to the ceiling.

He would.

She flinched as he brought the chainsaw crashing down in a blur of frenzied motion, again and again. Lydia blinked as the machine died with a growl. She didn’t feel any pain. There was, however, a draft.

Pulling down the surgical mask he blew the last scrap of her shredded clothes off her unharmed chest, then leaned the chainsaw on one shoulder and pushed up his goggles to admire the view. “Yep, it just had to come off.”

For a breathless moment Lydia lay naked and stunned under his perusal, her eyes stinging with acrid smoke and her heartbeat pounding in her ears. 

Then the sprinkler system went off. 

The wail of the fire alarm and the rush of people panicking drowned out her startled shriek, muffled as it was by the belt between her teeth. But the spray of icy water had predictable results on certain portions of her anatomy that Beetlejuice found very interesting and, at this particular moment in time, she found completely humiliating. 

God, today just kept getting worse! If she wasn't this close to dying, she was being perved on by a poltergeist that only wanted one thing from her -- which turned out to be these utterly useless necromantic powers she apparently had? So what, in some other life she would have been normal and never met the Maitlands, make a stupid deal, or have any of this happen at all...?

At first he only noticed the way her sobbing shook her chest, however as he leaned in and blocked the sprinkler, the tears trickling down her cheeks were no longer hidden by the deluge. His eyes widened as he reared back, throwing down the chainsaw and ripping the goggles off. For a moment he struggled with himself, his face twitching with the force of his inner debate.

He shouldn’t care if she was crying. He totally didn’t care! The little bitch had been manipulating him from the start, and this was the least of what he could do to her…what he wanted to do. The more he hesitated, the angrier he got. His thoughts twisted down dark paths, involving tangled limbs and incoherent begging.

He had a bad habit of maiming people, when they actually managed to hurt whatever vestige of humanity still cowered meekly in his psyche. His reluctance now to lash out and utterly crush the cause of his own pain as painfully as possible was confusing. And it wasn’t because the cause in this case was a hot chick, because that had never mattered before when the cut ran this deep (as one particularly memorable ex-lover had found out, much to her very momentary surprise).

It was because Lydia was…Lydia. Shit, what had she done to him? Sure, she’d lied. Who didn’t lie to him? And she’d tried to make him sign a stupid contract. And she’d argued with him and called him names. Nothing new there. And she was a baby necromancer who’d been feeding off his energy through an accidental bond, not dead and a ghost at all. (Although, fuck, she'd come really damn close to making it true!) He’d already proven she couldn’t control him. Hell, her Grams couldn’t bind him for more than five minutes using his true name! And she didn’t actually want to marry him. Well, add her to the list of every single fucking person he had ever met that didn’t want anything to do with him! It was a damned long list. He couldn’t even pinpoint the exact thing he was so furious about.

The fire alarm was starting to get seriously annoying. So he rearranged reality. Now, the alarm and the sprinklers had never gone off, and the fire was reduced to so much smoldering ash on the carpet. He left the water which had fallen on Lydia, though. Because he could. 

With the next blink of his eye where the bunk bed had been there was now an old-fashioned therapist’s couch where a shivering and tearful Lydia was strapped into a straight jacket with sleeves that merged into the plush red upholstery. She also had on a fifties circle skirt rucked up over sheer petticoats, garters, and stockings. Black patent Mary Janes were very securely fastened to her feet. Because this was his show, dammit, and he could do what he liked, not because any of it might make her feel better.

Beetlejuice settled back into a cushy armchair and ran a hand over his grease-tamed hair. Peering at her through a monocle he said, “Now, Miz Lydia, it iz quite natural to weep, ve haf had an enormoz breakthrough today. But for me to help you, you must anzer my questions vith nozing but the truth!”

She shouted something which was rendered incoherent by the belt in her mouth and strained against the fabric that held her captive. She aimed a kick in his direction but it fell sadly short. He enjoyed the view while it lasted, though. 

She couldn’t decide if it would have been better or worse if he hadn’t shredded her granny panties and he was leering at her in hideous support underwear, rather than this getup which had surely belonged to a very different sort of grandma back in the day. The kind that didn’t wear underwear.

“Temper, temper!” He wagged a finger and pulled a notebook out of the vest of his three piece tweed suit. His sharp teeth glittered and he said, “Ve mustn’t let our inner demons control us.” He flipped the notebook open to a page filled with scribbles and little stick figures making faces. “Anzer yes or no! I vill know if you lie, and you vill be _punished_.” An elaborate wooden cabinet appeared covered with switches and clockwork and gold lettering that spelled out 'Truth-o-meter.' There was a large gauge with a needle balanced between ‘falsity’ and ‘veracity’ with two electrodes on top on either side, red and green. “Have you ever had a man, shall ve say, intimately?”

Lydia’s eyes widened and her brow furrowed. This particular question was hardly what she’d expected. He had no business...! What the hell did he care about that, really? Hypocritical asshole! It made her angry enough to want to say, ‘Yes, like a hundred, it’s my body and I can do what I want with it.’ However, she could only nod contemptuously.

Beetlejuice himself was a little surprised at what had come out of his mouth, not having really intended on questioning her virginity, but he found that he was intently interested in her answer. How much of her behavior today was just an act? How far would she go to play him for a fool? 

When she nodded glaring daggers at him, he wanted to break somebody’s face. Then the Truth-o-meter buzzed harshly and the red light flashed. A laugh burst out of him. “My naughty little spooky muffin! Do ya want to be bent over my knee?” An unhappy thought intruded. “Or was it just a _boy_ that laid his mitts on you?”

Frowning thunderously Lydia nodded again, and again the Truth-o-meter ratted her out.

“That’s twice, babycakes. You a masochist or somethin’?” With a thought he was sitting on the end of the couch. The original plan to punish her had been a lot more complicated, involving a water wheel, some goat cheese, a hundred scorpions, and a clerical collar. Then she tried to kick him again. An impulse seized him as he caught her by the ankles. It was time to find out what she was really made of.

One leg was tucked under his arm and he brought the other to his lips, then proceeded to lick up her shoe to her ankle, which he bit hard. Not enough to break the skin, but definitely enough to make an impression. “One down, one to go,” he said, teeth scraping over the buckle of the ankle strap. He would vehemently deny going easy on her if anyone ever asked.

Then his striped tongue slobbered over her leg all the way up to her knee. She writhed in a desperate attempt to dislodge him, or at least wipe that stupid smirk off his face with the bony side of her shin. Latching on to the tender curve at the back of her knee, he made a truly impressive hickey. That would take a while to heal up on a mortal woman, a fact that he found doubly satisfying after her little 'I'm dead and there's nothing you can do about it' charade. He let go with an obscene smacking noise and the snap of the stocking, and just barely avoided a knee cap to the nose. 

“Wanna go ahead and lie to me again? ‘Cause I gotta tell ya I consider ‘legs’ to include what’s between ‘em and I’m looking forward to punishing you some more.” 

It hadn’t seemed possible that Lydia could look more outraged, but somehow she managed. The barely restrained violence in how she breathed that taxed the ability of the straightjacket, the crackle of dark energy in her brown eyes, her absolute helplessness to actually do anything to him in retaliation – it all made him want to rile her up some more.

“It’s hardly my fault what you make me lick, babes.” He waggled his eyebrows at her.

She was really regretting having relented on the ‘Nothing Below the Waist’ rule.

“You wanna know what it feels like, don’t ya?”

Lydia froze. The worst part was, she did. She was too honest with herself to deny that she was curious about it. He just had to ask like that, when she could only nod yes or no, and couldn’t tack on, ‘but not with you, not like this’ or ‘I’m a teenager, what do you expect.’ She couldn’t help but feel that no matter what happened, she was going to be screwed in the very near future. Damned if she tried to deny her blasted virginal curiosity and damned if she admitted it. He would probably take a ‘yes’ like a formal invitation to her lady bits, complete with gilt edges and an R.S.V.P.

She squeezed her eyes shut, her mind racing away at a million miles a minute.

His hands, splayed over her thighs, inched up millimeter by millimeter as one second ticked by and then another. The calloused tips of his fingers found the garter straps and slipped under them.

Desperately wishing that _she_ could interrogate _him_ , and casting about for any solution, she came across a familiar presence inside her head. It felt like static and dust and she remembered it from her grandmother’s office as it invaded her entire body. So she grabbed onto Beetlejuice’s power with all her might. And, like a playful but obedient dog, it did what she asked.

And that is how she found herself wearing the tweed suit, holding on to Beetlejuice’s stocking-clad legs, and gritting her teeth against his efforts to wrest back his juice. It liked her better. She could tell by the way it wagged its mental impression of a tail at her.


	10. )11: In Which a Four-Letter L-Word Is Uttered

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is pretty lemony and I bumped the rating up to explicit, but the actual lemon is marked off with a warning for those who do not wish to go all the way. And this is Beej we're talking about, so there are no cherubs singing or flower petals or anything like that. Lydia also practically magically enslaves him, so you might find that triggery (I think it registers somewhere on the "Inuyasha's Sit Necklace" level of bondage).

PREVIOUSLY:

Desperately wishing that she could interrogate him, and casting about for any solution, she came across a familiar presence inside her head. It felt like static and dust and she remembered it from her grandmother’s office as it invaded her entire body. So she grabbed onto Beetlejuice’s power with all her might. And, like a playful but obedient dog, it did what she asked.

And that is how she found herself wearing the tweed suit, holding on to Beetlejuice’s stocking-clad legs, and gritting her teeth against his efforts to wrest back his juice. It liked her better. She could tell by the way it wagged its mental impression of a tail at her. 

AND NOW, ON WITH THE STORY!  
. 

Chapter Eleven: In Which a Four-Letter L-Word Is Uttered  
.

Picture a dog. It's one of those dogs that doesn’t realize how big it actually is, which happens to be closer to the size of a living room than a small horse. Lydia couldn’t help but imagine Beetlejuice’s power as a panting, slobbering, hairy mutt. And the unseen tableau here was disconcertingly like those tear-jerking scenes in the movies where the pet has to choose his real owner with someone on each side of the room whistling and saying, “Come on, over here, boy!” 

In fact, concentrating on that imagery was really helping Lydia get a handle on this new form of mental warfare. Her sense of his power tended to fade if she concentrated too hard or too little, and that was apparently just right.

The initial and abrupt turnabout when Lydia latched onto his energy had been startling for them both. Lydia, confronted by Beetlejuice wearing drag again (she hadn’t realized that her former outfit had included neon bright lipstick, winged eyeliner, and bouffant curls), did not recover as quickly. He was able to outmaneuver her hold on his legs, which the stockings made slippery. Before she could roll off the couch, he had those same legs wrapped around her waist, trapping her in place.

Their battle of wills over the ownership of his power continued. Beetlejuice was not above cheating, using the metaphysical equivalent of dangling a juicy bone behind his back. His power liked creating chaos. It naturally flowed to places with the most potential for disorder. And Beetlejuice was promising to wreck all kinds of mischief, mostly on Lydia, immediately upon the return of his juice.

Well, she knew how to fight dirty too. Abandoning her attempts to escape, she reached down between them and rooted through fluffy petticoats. When she hit pay dirt, he went still with a muffled grunt. She loosened the leather strap over his mouth and shouted over the profanities that spewed forth, “If you don’t stop fighting me right now, I will do unspeakable things to you with this!” She shook the strap.

He eyed her warily, then the corner of his mouth quirked up. “…You promise?”

“Oh, I _promise_.” If she hadn’t had his attention before, she definitely had it now (especially with the Truth-o-meter declaring her utterly serious intent, not a hint of red). She lifted the strap off so that it was around her two fingers, and then tightened it with her teeth until her skin around the strap lost what little color she normally had. For emphasis, she jerked her head one more time and squeezed with her other hand down below. 

Under her palm something…grew. Her breath caught a little at the realization that he had not previously been erect. Apparently he liked her being on top a lot more than his crazy psychoanalyst routine.

Meanwhile, she had sneakily managed to get a firm hold on his power too, with the expedient of her mental self sitting down and offering it tummy rubs, which were enthusiastically accepted. Trying to understand what that actually meant, outside of the terms of her doggy metaphor, was almost enough to shatter her sanity. She thought of a collar and leash. When they appeared in her mindscape she could see that they were actually just one word, spoken over and over. They wouldn’t go over the dog’s head though, and it occurred to her that it was because she would have to actually say it out loud. 

Desperately, she tried to recall the intonation her grandmother had used. Would it be good or bad if she accidentally put him Back if she tried to do this? Either sending him Back or Binding him, failure was not an option.

To keep him from guessing what she was planning, she demanded, “Why do you want to marry me?” The fact that she really wanted to know was beside the point. However, she might actually follow through with her threat of…strangulation, no matter how squeamish the thought made her, if he said…

Beetlejuice thanked his lucky stars that the damn machine he'd juiced up could only tell if a statement was true, and not if it actually answered the question. “Pretty sure we discussed the terms when I proposed, O dominatrix of my cold dead heart.” The Truth-o-meter flashed green. “I want Out.” Green again. 

Expected answer or not, Lydia saw red. Wincing after each wrong try, she snapped, “Beetlegiuce, Beetlegeuse, Betelguese!”

The power in her voice rang out, leaving her throat scraped raw. The collar that wasn’t really a collar slipped onto the dog that wasn’t really a dog and shrunk down into a smooth, unbroken metal ring. They crashed onto the ashy floor as the couch disappeared along with all the other things he had conjured, including the outfit he was wearing. The ghost himself, however, remained.

She had her hand on the crotch of a naked Beetlejuice. She was wearing his striped suit. Her hand was…! Her dorm was a blackened wasteland. Her hand was touching his bare skin, without any petticoat in the way, right on his…! Needless to say, Lydia was freaking out.

“What the hell? !” Beetlejuice exclaimed, propping himself up on his elbows. “What the fuck did you just do? !” His eyes followed her line of sight down to where her shell-shocked gaze was glued onto her hand on his crotch. 

Lydia couldn’t make herself look away. It was like watching a train wreck. You don’t want to and you know it’s wrong, but there’s just something endlessly fascinating about how horrible it is. There was dirt. And mold in weird places. As if preening under all the attention, little Beetlejuice twitched against her palm and did his very best salute.

“Goddam, babes, are ya just gonna stare at my dick all day, or are ya gonna _do_ something with it?” he rasped out huskily.

She hastily snatched her hand back, blurting out, “I’m sorry!” She was up and facing the other direction almost before her words reached his ears. Yanking off his suit jacket, she thrust it behind her in his general direction, where a ridiculously orchestral groan and a muted thump were her only signals of him throwing himself flat on the ground in exasperation. 

What, exactly, had she done? The dog, which she now just thought of as ‘Juice,’ was whining unhappily in her mental landscape while it scratched at the collar with a hind leg and chewed on the chain leash connected to his ring on her finger.

Experimentally, she said, “Betel-” Even she felt the electric shock that vibrated through their connection, mild as it was. Clearing her throat, she tried again. “Beetlejuice.”

“Would you cut that shit out?” he snarled, picking himself up. For some reason that eluded him, he was having a difficult time floating and he actually had to resort to the chore of real, physical movement. 

The rustle of cloth assured her that he was putting on his jacket. Turning around, she said, “I want to reopen our previous negotiations regarding the terms of your propos…I can’t talk to you like this!” She whirled back around with a resolution not to look at him again until she had some kind of guarantee that he was not pointing in her direction.

He had put on his striped jacket normally, so that it left the whole front length of his body on display. The clothing only served to highlight a certain member of his anatomy. There was no help for it. She would just have to give him the pants, too. 

He watched bemusedly as she stripped. Nearly ripping out the laces in her haste to untie his boots, she eventually got them off and then shimmied out of the pants, which she tossed over her shoulder at him.

She should have guessed that he didn’t wear boxers. The magenta shirt barely covered her essentials, even as oversized as his clothing was on her.

“…Do ya really think taking off my pants is going to lead to us fucking talking?”

“Just Put The Pants On!” Lydia felt like she’d licked a battery. That was not a suggestion, and they both knew it.

Beetlejuice tried to play it off like he had a choice in the matter even as he was hopping into the pants as quickly as inhumanly possible, which strangely was only a little faster than humanly possible at the moment. He muttered, “Fine, alright. Since ya asked so nicely.”

Hearing the zipper a second time amidst vociferous swearing condemning the infernal device back to hell, Lydia thought it was probably safe to turn around, but she still hesitated.

“There,” he huffed as he buckled the belt and his hands obeyed him once more. “I’m wearin’ ‘em. What d’ya want now yer pickiness, Princess Chastity of Prudeston?”

She faced him, tilting her chin up with proud determination. They couldn’t go on like this, it just wasn’t healthy. His little demonstration proved that. Their relationship – no, they didn't have a relationship. Their deal had been a farce from the beginning, and it was time to end it. “I think we should see other people,” she declared.

“What,” he said flatly, scowling. His hands clenched slowly into fists.

“I remember what you said to me. The terms of your proposal?” She shook back the overlong cuffs of his shirt and crossed her arms. “You just want Out. Well, here you are! Beetlejuice!” 

He made an abortive motion to stop her. “No - Stop! ARGH.”

“Beetlejuice, _Beetlejuice_ , BEETLEJUICE!” Each time it came out louder until she was hunched over from shouting at him and her cheeks were flushed bright red.

By the time she finished, he was writhing in pain with his hands clamped over his ears, and when she let up, breathing hard, he slumped over limp on the floor. But he was still there.

“You’re good and stuck here right now, aren’t you? I hope you’re happy! Welcome to the world of the living.” She gestured expansively at the beige and black wreck of a dorm room. “What are you going to do now? Get a job like the rest of the schmucks on the planet, go down to the local dive when your shift is done, have a brew and hit on the barflies? You gonna watch sports and have a shit fit when your team loses? Live in the ‘burbs and cut the grass every weekend? What’s so great about being up here, huh?”

He wasn’t moving. Not a twitch. For a dead guy, he looked…really dead.

Cautiously, she stepped closer. If anybody deserved whatever she’d just done it was him, but she still felt guilty. She wasn’t the kind of girl to lead somebody on and then leave them high and dry, which was kind of why she was in this mess in the first place. “Look, all I really meant is that you have options now. This whole marriage of inconvenience thing isn’t the only way. We can make a new deal. You didn’t really want to be stuck with me forever, right?”

No response.

Her brow furrowed. “Beej, come on. We can come up with something that’ll make both of us happy, which I think is pretty generous, considering. Hell, we can break this weird bond thing we have and I’ll even help you find a woman who wants to marry you if you’re still dead set on it. No pun intended.”

He slowly picked himself up, face turned away. “Oh, you will, huh?” It wasn’t in his nature to be introspective, but her little power trip had made taking a tour through the hell he called his mind necessary. Lying there on the floor with his ears ringing, he’d come across some rather…interesting things (such as a small but growing temple district with shrines dedicated to various parts of Lydia’s body that he wanted to worship).

A tinge of apprehension gripped her, but she rallied and said, “Yes.”

His eyes slid over to her. Her heart stopped cold at the look on his face. This was what fear felt like. It mocked any weak imitation that had bothered her before. Icy sweat broke out on her back and her throat went completely dry. She froze, muscles twitching and ready but unable to move. Her breath stuttered. 

No human expression could describe that decaying face.

“Good. Great. Wonderful. Fan-fuckin-tastic. Your first step should be to make up your own GODDAMN mind!” He reached for her, his filthy yellow claws scraping across her skin. 

She thought that she knew what he was. But the girl who prided herself on seeing the strange and unusual had only scratched the surface of the horror hiding beneath his playful malice. 

“I found a woman who wants me, but she thinks she can run away,” he explained impatiently.

“I don’t!” Lydia managed to squeak.

“That so? Then it was some _other_ girlie this afternoon, moanin’ beneath me.” His rough hands glided down her arms and across her waist over the satin shirt, the barest hint of a caress, and she trembled. “But she looked a fuck of a lot like you! Same face, same hair.” He reached the placket and tore the shirt open, making buttons ping all over.

She gasped. He lifted his glowing gaze to stare into her eyes. Forcing her numb limbs into motion, she tried to back away, to clutch the fabric closed.

“Yep. Same hooters.” A wickedly sharp fingernail traced the hickeys he’d left behind. “And look! Same pattern.” His pleased smile outdid a shark’s.

His gentle touches were leaving behind trails of fire that contrasted hotly with his cold skin. She was wavering in her resolution. It was worrisome how exciting she found being absolutely terrified when there was no chance that he would kill her or, it seemed, even seriously injure her. But she had to be strong, to show him that she wouldn't be toyed with. 

“There are a lot of fish in the sea,” she said, shoving against his firm chest heedless that it was bare. Her palms encountered muscles. Lots of them. Oh. She may have just groped his pecs. Whoops? “It won’t take you very long to get over me, I’m sure!” she insisted.

He flexed his arms and she was falling, but he only let her drop the last inch or so by herself. Then he was sliding in between her splayed thighs and looming over her. “Nope, it won’t,” he said, running his hands over her hips.

“You asshole-!”

He interrupted. “I don’t wanna look at other options. I’m not interested in renegotiating!” She’d asked if he really wanted to be stuck with her forever, and the truth was that he really did. He could see a lot of benefits to that situation.

His fingers tangled in the curls below her navel and his thumb sought downwards, brushing over something on the way that made her back arch and stars appear. He brought it back to his mouth slick with moisture. The sight of his striped tongue wrapped around his thumb licking it clean made her stomach clench. 

“I’ve got the fish I want,” he said, leaning in. “Right. Here.” 

That sounded like…but it couldn’t... Her nerveless fingers seized his lapels. “Swear that I’m the only one. Tell me that there will never be anyone else.”

He hesitated, staring at her vulnerable face, at her mouth softly open and her fawn brown eyes. “I always said if I was gonna get hitched, I was only gonna do it once,” he muttered. Her taste lingered like dark, sweet licorice. He smacked his lips, hungry for more. 

Lydia tangled her legs with his and pulled him down nose to nose. “Swear or we’re done!”

His twisted eyebrows flew up. “…I think I love you,” he finally said.

“That works too,” she breathed, and finally kissed him.

[following scene contains very adult content]

The kiss began tenderly, Lydia's inexperience making her hesitant. This was the first time she had kissed him, instead of letting him kiss her. Lips seeking his with gentle sincerity, she struggled to find the right angle to keep their noses out of the way. Beetlejuice thought that if he hadn't already been dead, the shock of lust that her innocent exploration sent through him might have finished him off. His eyes rolled back in his head and closed, savoring the beatific hedonism of the moment.

He pressed full length against her body, sending shivers through the soft swell of her stomach and pebbling her nipples with the icy friction of his hairy bare chest. His erection strained against her through the tight confines of his pants and the vise of her legs pulled him more firmly into her embrace. Moaning, he helplessly thrust against her. Her tongue dipped into his open mouth shyly, tasting herself there.

He lost it.

He didn't want a little piece of the pie at a time, he wanted the whole damn thing right now! He sank his hands in the dark spill of her hair and deepened the kiss fiendishly, his tongue fighting hers back and then counting her molars. Her breasts heaving against him as she fought to breathe through her nose distracted him and he lost count. Oh well. He'd just start over. The heat of her thighs cradling his hips distracted him again, but the way she pressed up against him and rubbed her wetness over the barrier of his zipper made him forget what he was doing entirely.

The pants needed to go. But he couldn't even raise a hand to undo the fly, which was the diametric opposite of Putting Them On. Her order still held strong. 

Her little hands slipped under his jacket to rake down the muscles of his back and over his ass, which she squeezed.

He broke the kiss to swear on everything he held sacred, "Fuck me, Lydia!"

She giggled breathlessly. He turned her laughter into broken gasps by cupping a breast and rolling the nipple between his thumb and index finger. Lowering his head, he flicked his tongue over the other. His free hand snuck down south. Varying his rhythm changed the pitch of her inarticulate exclamations, and he played her like a turn table until he hit a combination that had her tossing her head back, choked mute with pleasure as he skillfully suspended her in the valley just before her peak.

He let up a little and waited for his opportunity. When she found her voice again, she pleaded, "Beej, come on...please, please don't stop!" 

Leaving off nibbling down her sternum, he said, "Take off my pants and I won't."

"Pants?" She blinked, her dazzled brain not immediately making the connection.

"You told me to put 'em on, remember?" He tried to sound pissed off about it to complete the ruse, but he was having some trouble thinking about anything except the pretty flush that tipped her breasts with a darker coral. And maybe the way her eyes glittered black with desire, her brown irises eaten by her dilated pupils. Or how tightly she'd gripped one finger as he slid it in, how that would feel on... "I can't take 'em off," he whined, enormously frustrated.

"Oh!" she said, biting her lip.

"Oh?" he demanded.

With a slow, wicked smile, she nudged at his shoulders until he let her push him down on his back. As he watched with an intrigued smirk, she knelt and kissed her way down his chest while her nimble fingers made quick work of his belt and the button. Delicately taking the tab of the zipper between her teeth, she pulled it down and challenged him by saucily holding his incandescent green gaze with her own dark stare.

Screwing up her courage, Lydia tugged the pants down his legs with her hands while he helpfully lifted his hips. Then she turned her face to nuzzle her cheek against him, a patch of mold tickling her chin. Teasing him like this was almost as much fun as pissing him off, and really unbearably exciting. She rubbed her legs together to relieve the sodden tickle at the juncture of her thighs. From the coiled strength tensing every single muscle in his body, taunting him was also incredibly dangerous. Swallowing hard, she dared to press a chaste kiss on the vein running along the underside of his engorged penis.

The next thing she knew she was flat on her back and he was balls deep, going to town. "Holy shit!" she screamed. It didn't exactly hurt, she had been so aroused, but - "Oh my god!" she wailed as he bent her knees and drove harder. She pounded on his shoulder and shouted, "I'm a virgin, dammit!"

"Not anymore!" he retorted and thumbed her clit.

Her orgasm, lurking in the wings for so long, ripped through her like a hurricane. He pounded through the aftershocks then withdrew, leaving her to collapse bonelessly. Scarcely able to raise her head, she managed to ask, "Did you, um...?"

"Time for that later, babes," he rasped, eying her vulnerable position. There was something he'd been wanting to do all damn day, and here she was all limp and panting and in no shape to resist. Experimentally, he draped her legs over his shoulders. She barely twitched. Some chicks didn't like it, but Lydia'd never even tried it, so...

"What are you-?"

This might be his only chance (although, if he had anything to say about it, which he would if his plan worked, she would have to get used to being three square meals a day). He was gonna make the most out of it. He licked her from stem to stern.

"Hoh - oh! A-ah! Beetlejuice, B-Beej, B...!"

They were just getting started.


	11. )12: The Perils of Over- and Under-thinking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The morning after. Lydia comes to grips with some regrets and Beej takes full advantage...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyho, this is the long overdue next chapter! (Sorry, Real Life was stealing all my soul energy). If you were perfectly fine with where we left off and imagining that they lived and unlived sexily-ever-after, the next bits may not be for you. Things are getting ready to go off the rails with getting ready for the wedding and meeting Lydia's extended family, so it may have too much Original Character crackiness. But there are also more sexy times, so...? Let's turn up the juice and see what shakes loose!

Lydia felt like a ridiculous teenage cliché as she just sat there afterwards and stared at him. Namely the ‘my first time was not what I was expecting at all’ regret, which comes in many flavors.

Right in the middle of her second…anyway, he’d bent all his considerable will to freeing Juice from her leash. It had been like holding onto Tam Lin. In her mindscape the dog grew and mutated and shrunk and transformed, from snake to mouse to hydra and countless creatures she couldn’t even name – none of which could slip the similarly protean collar. Connected by the chain, she had been yanked this way and that and upside down, but she’d already decided to just lay back, hang on, and enjoy the ride. It was a roller coaster. It was straddling a tiger bareback while holding it by the tail. You were safe – as long as you never let go. 

At the end, though, he’d choked himself out when at last the collar couldn’t keep up with the transformation from ant to behemoth leviathan.

Lying there unconscious he didn’t look tamed in any way, shape, or form. Nudity stripped him of even the flimsy pretense of civility that his clothes had afforded him. His white skin reflected the moonlight spilling through the window like a smudged mirror, shadows robbing his mildew of color. He could have been a cave creature that had just clawed its way out of long confinement in murky darkness, and he had the muscles to prove it. He had a paunch, but it was mostly because he was built like a barrel. A really built barrel. And…the way he’d touched her…the things his strong hands could do….

Blushing, she shook her head violently. If she could believe that he actually meant what he’d said, that would be one thing. She'd realized too late that he only said it because she wanted him to. If she could force him to do things with her words, how much did her subconscious desires influence his physical actions? After all, he’d injured himself trying to get away from her mental control. 

What the hell was this tiger going to do to her when she lost her grip on his tail? His little temper tantrum about lying had been bad enough. She was so screwed! Literally!

She covered her face with her hands and flopped onto her back, hissing as the half-melted, mostly-charred remnants of carpet dug into tender places. 

The thump to the floor dislodged a precarious pile of slag that might have once been a stack of bridal magazines, which revealed a flash of yellow-grey visible out of the corner of her eye, through her fingers.

With no solution to her problem forthcoming, she had nothing better to do than go unearth what turned out to be a miraculously unburned book with a title she could just make out in the dark: “Basic Necromancy for Dummies.”

“Grandma, you’re the best!” she breathed, and settled down to study up by the door, which she cracked open to let in the light of the hallway.

The introduction read as follows: Can you see dead people? Do spirits talk to you, give you news from the other side, tell you where you left your socks, foretell the future, etc.? Ever accidentally go around animating dead tissue? Have you ever breached the gates of death and/or drawn a soul away from the underworld? If so, congratulations! You may be a natural necromancer. Here are five tests to confirm your potential that can be performed in the comfort of your own home with some simple ingredients….

Unfortunately for Lydia, “Advanced Necromancy for Dummies” would have been much more applicable to her situation. The basic book only dealt with poltergeists level one through three (harmless to alarming), and the Administration had run out of numbers trying to categorize a certain ghost with the most. 

-SCENE BREAK-

Beetlejuice woke up with the worst hangover he’d ever had. It felt like he’d tried to cleave open his head with a battle axe so he could pour the liquor straight into his brain again. That had been a shit-stupid idea the first time, why would he…? 

The soft sound of – yes – someone sorting through burnt out wreckage reached his ears. He’d heard it often enough before. He peeled open one eye and was treated to the delightful sight of Lydia puttering around wearing only his striped jacket in the scanty light of dawn. 

Oh, yeah. The memories started drifting back in through the splitting headache and a toothy grin cracked open his face. Oh _fuck yeah_. He did not regret his little white lie at all; one four letter L-word is a lot like another, right? It had saved him from making a freaking goddamned permanent oath, and – this was his favorite part – was apparently the mystical key to Lydia’s ironclad chastity belt. Who knew?

Hell, maybe he DID lo…like her, since he was fairly certain she had ruined him for anybody else. Orders of any kind tended to stroke him the wrong way, but when Lydia told him, “More,” with that damned Binding voice of hers…let’s just say it made him feel things. Naughty things. After a while he hadn’t even minded not having control of his own powers, although when he got them back he was definitely going to turn on the juice and return the favor (not that she’d had any complaints about his performance this go round, he was sure). It probably also helped that she hadn’t told him to do anything he didn’t want to do already. Except putting on his pants, but since she took them off him herself with her teeth not five minutes later he was willing to let that one pass.

He’d been dead so long he barely even remembered being alive, but an exchange of spiritual essences just wasn’t the same as swapping spit, among other things. The empty dances of the dead were a vainglorious shadow play that he had often and repeatedly reveled in whenever he got the chance, but it was like bitter ashes in comparison to the taste of the real thing she’d given him. He licked his lips. 

Or maybe that was real ash, from him setting everything on fire yesterday. Normally an ashy coating wouldn’t bother him, but today he was more embodied than he’d been in a long time, short of possessing a breather. His old flesh suit was occupying the same space he was instead of shunted just to the left of reality where he normally kept it (it had been him, so it could be used to control him like a meat puppet voodoo doll, therefore he’d stolen it). A certain little necromancer was probably responsible, since he also had a sluggish pulse and a slight interest in breathing for its own sake. Thankfully he still looked like his normal gorgeous self and not a leathery mummy. Whatever. If that’s what Lydia was into, it was fine with him.

Now if only his head would stop hurting, he was definitely up for round two: the morning after. Souls could certainly be injured and feel pain, but it was a lot more annoying in a semi-physical body that he couldn’t just snap his fingers and fix. 

He certainly wouldn’t repeat the mistake he’d made last night. He’d thought it would be easy to retake control of their bond while she was ‘otherwise occupied.’ Lydia picked things up quick, though, which was a hell of a lot of fun in bed but a nuisance in this case. Whatever hold she had on him had been too strong to break her control without breaking the bond, which he didn't want to do. It tied Lydia to Beetlejuice as tightly as the other way around, among other delightful things…

“Damn it!” Lydia’s exclamation broke into his thoughts. 

“Whatsit now?” He levered himself up.

She held up a black dress, which momentarily blocked his excellent view of her long legs before it fell apart along the scorch marks. “Did you have to ruin all my clothes?” As he smirked and opened his mouth to reply, she dropped the ragged straps with a sigh and said, “No, don’t answer that. The one time it would be nice if you could pull one of your quick changes, and you’re....” She made an incomprehensible gesture.

“I’m what?” he ground out. His biceps flexed and his eyebrow twitched as she continued to stare at him. His head was even aching too much to joke about her liking what she saw (he knew she did, most eligible bachelor since Valentino crossed over, here).

Lydia had to steel herself against flinching. “…Tired?” she deadpanned. “I’d let you do it, even. You formally have my permission to change what I’m wearing.” She smiled wryly and struck a pose, one hand belatedly keeping the oversized suit jacket from gaping at the bottom. 

Even through his annoyance and headache Beetlejuice had a brief vision of exactly the black dress he wanted her to wear if she insisted on being clothed. He held up his thumbs and forefingers to frame her and pictured it. He even had permission, how was it fair that – it worked. He blinked and the vision didn’t change. He got up on his knees to better appreciate it, close enough to reach out and touch, although he refrained for now to savor the moment. There were loopholes, and then there were glaringly obvious, exploitable, practically gift-wrapped loopholes.

Lydia was incredulously picking at the extremely daring neckline. “How did…? How is this even staying on? Is this glue? !” Her eyes lifted to glare at him heatedly. “And more importantly, do I look like Elvira, freaking Mistress of the Dark to you?”

He tilted his head and squinted. “Yeah, pretty much.” Her aura pulsed dangerously against his through the bond, sending sensation crawling down his spine. Combined with the way she was looking at him it was just too much. “But you’re way hotter,” he added absently, investing his attention in memorizing the shapely outlines of her bared leg with his hands. He was already rock hard and he wanted her, but it was the throbbing in his other head that was really putting a damper on things. As his strokes got higher her breath caught, and he wheedled, “Dark mistress, why don’t you tell me I can heal?”

Slightly slack jawed, she was still sharp enough to ask, “Why?”

“Because my head’s hurtin’ trying to comprehend the way your breasts defy gravity,” he said, but it was a bad job and he knew it. Damn. He could see her putting the pieces together, just like he had.

She could have smacked herself on the forehead. Words had power: oaths, promises, permissions, spells, and names. There were warnings to watch what you said nearly every other page in “Basic Necromancy.” 

Lifting her hand, she thought better of smoothing her thumb over the furrows between his eyebrows caused by tension and pain. They were her fault. She let her hand fall.   
Looks aside, Lydia didn't think she was cut out to be a dark mistress of anything, and she didn't much feel like enforcing her will on an unwilling captive. In what universe would Beetlejuice be kneeling at her feet of his own free will and asking for permission? But releasing him so that he could tie her up and terrorize her didn't sound like a good option either (despite a little whisper in the back of her mind saying that letting him have his wicked way with her sounded fantastic, actually).

There was really only one thing she could do. “Heal away,” she said. How he could possibly use that particular power against her, she had no clue. Then again she wasn’t a centuries-old, deceitful, manipulative poltergeist, either. She was so going to regret this.

She sighed, the rise and fall of twin perfection a benediction from his own personal sex goddess. A thought later all the negative effects of his ill-conceived coup attempt were mended, he was feeling better than ever, and...her stranglehold on their bond was loosened by just that much.

He’d finally reached the place that he wanted to stroke most, when her hands caught at his and she leaned down to look him directly in the eyes. She was looking pinched and even more sleep-deprived than she usually did, with purple liberally smudged under her eyes. She said, very clearly, “You don’t have to do this.”   
He rocked back on his heels and blinked, nonplussed. “…This?” 

“Kneeling at my feet and calling me mistress and…stuff.” She bit her lip, making his eyes zero in. So he had the perfect opportunity to read her lips as she said, “I’m sorry for…using you last night. I don’t want you to do anything sexual that you don’t want to.”

His fingers on her thigh tightened. Was he really hearing this? ! He nearly cackled with glee. How the hell did he stumble over a hot as fuck, totally untrained necromancer with a serious yen for his yang? Yesterday she’d wrapped him up tighter than a black widow, then proceeded to ride him like her personal bronco. Today she was apparently under the impression that it was all her idea. Ha!

He would certainly disabuse her of the notion that she could make him do anything he didn’t want to, unless he let her make him. Who did she think he was? 

But first he could use this to weasel more concessions from her; every little bit helped. He didn’t know how it would stand up to her actually ordering him to do something, but there was a chance even that wouldn’t work. He dragged back up the resentment he still felt about her lying to him about being a ghost, and said, “But if you can make me want to do something…”

She looked stricken. Seriously, he thought she might fall down. He helpfully pulled one of her legs over his shoulder to make it easier to steady her with his hands on her ass.

If she had waited and thought this through when she hadn’t been up all night worrying and studying that book (which at that very moment was not very carefully hidden under more crispy-fried bridal magazines), she might have worked out a way to express the freedom she wanted to give him that couldn’t be taken the wrong way. “You can feel anything you want about me,” she said, to forestall whatever she was unintentionally compelling him to do at the moment.

“Gee, thanks! That’s sweet of you,” he practically chirped. “Why don’t you let me show you,” he continued in his full throated, gravelly timbre while pulling her in towards his face, finally mumbling, “how sweet you are?” against her skin.

On the other hand, then she would have missed out on his extremely creative interpretations of feeling anything he wanted about her and changing what she was wearing.


	12. )13:

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last part of the story that got written before...well, before Life stomped on me really hard. After my own shit-storm of a failed wedding, I couldn't even look at this for a long time.
> 
> So it feels like maybe half of an actual chapter (didn't even get through the training montage and Lydia's parents showing up), but I polished it up a bit and here you go, whoever is reading this ancient relic.

PREVIOUSLY:  
By the time they escaped her grandmother’s wedding-mad clutches, Lydia and Beetlejuice had been subjected to a rigorous interrogation about every single person they had ever met in their entire lives and/or existences who might possibly be invited. The most auspicious dates for weddings had been debated with the intensity of a life and death battle. They had been grilled about color choices. They’d been given the third degree over flowers, put on the rack over the style of invitations, gone through the wringer picking a location, and told to come back tomorrow after they had perused a stack of magazines and brochures that towered over both of them.

-SCENE BREAK-

If she had waited and thought this through when she hadn’t been up all night worrying and studying that book (which at that very moment was not very carefully hidden under more crispy-fried bridal magazines), she might have worked out a way to express the freedom she wanted to give him that couldn’t be taken the wrong way. “You can feel whatever you want about me,” she said, to forestall whatever she was unintentionally compelling him to do at the moment.

“Gee, thanks! That’s sweet of you,” he practically chirped. “Why don’t you let me show you,” he continued in his full throated, gravelly timbre while pulling her in towards his face, finally mumbling, “how sweet you are?” against her skin.

On the other hand, then she would have missed out on his extremely creative interpretations of feeling whatever he wanted about her and changing what she was wearing.

AND NOW, ON WITH THE STORY!

Chapter Thirteen: 

Lydia sprawled limply on the magenta sheets of a black and white striped four-poster stuck upside down to the ceiling. Any doubts she'd had about her fiancé's willing participation had been banished by the extraordinary and filthy nature of the things she'd just been party to. On her best day, she wouldn't have been able to come up with half of that. 

She was panting and her toes were still curling, but she couldn’t really say she regretted letting Beetlejuice heal, even if it had already come back to bite her in the backside. Several times. Being too tired was also apparently curable, and she shuddered when she felt the rippling cessation of _exhausted_ and _sore_ go through her limbs.

“You want to go again? !” she demanded, propping herself up on one elbow to face the poltergeist lounging at her side. The top sheet was artfully, and just barely, draped over his essentials. _Like the cover of a romance and/or horror novel titled, “Sexy Beast from the Beyond,”_ she thought, and then disavowed ever thinking that. Maybe the real problem here was that he was subconsciously influencing her, not the other way around. She needed her head examined.

“You’re insatiable, babes.” He took a drag on his cigarette and leered at her. “But no, we gotta meet up with Grams and I wanna teach you how to meditate first.”

She fell back flat bonelessly, not even bothering with the sheet. “You – You! want to teach me to meditate. So we can go see my grandmother.”

“I’m not any more thrilled by the idea of spending the next stretch of forever in a snow globe than you are. At least the wedding planning has an expiration date. Bearding the lion in its den is better than it jumping on ya unawares, amirite? The women in your family seem to be real go-getters, y’know what I mean.”

“My grandmother who you think is attractive. Am I hallucinating? That’s it.” She threw up her hands. “I’m actually catatonic or something and none of this is real. It explains so much about the past 24 hours of my life.”

“So, ya dream about me often? I might like to hear about that. In all seriousness, though….” He clamped the smoke in the corner of his mouth and sat up, dragging her with him. He quickly arranged her limbs into a classic lotus, rasping in her ear, “Start a dream diary. I want all the juicy details. Or maybe I’ll just wander in and take a look myself, eh?” 

“Don’t you dare!” She shoved him off, hoping that particular order would stick. For a while she had tried to avoid ordering him to do things, but it had become apparent in the midst of...certain activities...that if she wasn't actively powering her voice he didn't have to do what she said. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn't.

Cackling, he slumped against the headboard and got comfortable again.

She looked at her exacting pose, then at him, and raised an eyebrow.

“Sugar lips, when you’re as talented as I am, then ya get to ditch the training wheels. Now I want ya to breathe – nice and slow.”

Rolling her eyes as she closed them, Lydia took a deep breath while counting to seven. She held it for seven, let it slowly out…one…two…three…four…five…six…seven, ignoring his muttered, “Ooo, just like that,” while he honked her breast.

She said, “I know how to meditate, by the way. I took a class with Delia. Step-mother/daughter shared bonding time.”

“Sounds _super_ fun. Why doncha open your third eye, then, and we’ll get this show on the road.”

“…Open my third eye.”

“Don’t know how, do ya? Here, let me help.” He poked her forehead.

“Ow! God, get your finger out of my eye!” Her breathing rhythm broke and she winced. Two eyes stayed closed, but a third in the space between her wrinkled brows hesitatingly blinked open as her hands came up to shove him away. That was…different. "Basic Necromancy For Dummies" hadn’t said anything about having an honest-to-god third eye and not some metaphysical chakra thing.

Looking straight at him hurt. It wasn’t that he was glowing like a TV angel, he was just…more. He was vibrant color against a washed-out monotone world. He sat still and she saw echoes of movement, him now and him five minutes ago and him ten minutes from now and him a century ago and, dim behind the larger than life monstrous forms and carnival performances, a faded and barely recognizable man with a mocking laugh in the curl of his lip.

Squinting, she tried to shade her eye (the extra one!) with her hand only to discover that her hand actually was glowing like a neon sign. And so was the rest of her. She struggled to regain that easy feeling of calm and deep breathing that she had taken for granted before. “Beej. I know you don’t do straight answers. But. What. The. Fuck.” 

She could see that he was going to pull some bullshit routine, peering into her eye and telling her to watch his finger as if he was checking her vision. Now that she was looking for it she could see every damned second of it at once. Her head beginning to ache, she gritted out, “And I can see you waving your finger around fine from here so just…don’t.” 

The orderly sequence began to fray and branch off: maybe he would do it anyway, maybe he would play innocent, maybe he would haul off and kiss her, maybe, maybe, maybe – “I dunno what’s up with that,” he said.

“You don’t know?” she sputtered. “You told me to open my third eye and then stuck your finger in it and expect me to believe—“

Now the possibilities narrowed down, as myriad protestations of ignorance lead into a single monologue. In her vision of the future, he shrugged and said, “Usually a third eye’s nothin' but twisting your energy around. How was I s’posed to know you’d take it so literally? I guess you could be a mutant. Fall into any vats of ooze lately? Been hanging around A-bomb test sites? Or you’re not all human.” He spoke with an entirely unworried air, as if he couldn't care less about delivering what, to her, was a shattering realization.

Absorbed in the increasingly difficult task of making sense of what she saw, Lydia hardly paid attention to the present as Beetlejuice started acting out the third scenario from the upper left-right back quadrant. If she had to comment on his choice, she might have ranked it as one of the more dramatic options and aired her doubt that he was ever a boy scout, given when that organization was founded. 

Grabbing his hand, she cut him off before he could do more than flash the three-fingered salute. “What do you mean – _not all human_?” Her grasp of the immediate future slipped and it sank into the confusion of before- and afterimages haloing him.

“Ngh! Hasn’t anyone ever told you it’s rude to read people’s goddamned thoughts?” he snarled.

“I am not! And you threatened to gatecrash my dreams!”

“That’s different.”

“How?” Her normal eyes popped open to eye him incredulously. They blinked furiously as she tried to reconcile the familiar appearance of the world with the surreal, all-encompassing and unblinking vision of her third eye. Her stomach appreciated it even less than the drunk goggles from health class. Firmly closing two eyes, she said, “Ugh. Whatever. If it annoys you so much, help me turn it off!” She wanted this to go away, and never come back.

“Now that could get complicated.” Beetlejuice nonchalantly scratched at his moldy stubble, then snapped his fingers. “Have you tried, uh, hm…closing it?”

“Great solution, genius, I never would have thought of that.” Scrunching up her nose and exercising her eyebrows, she tried to get the damn thing to close. Tentatively, she poked around her forehead with her fingers, feeling the lash-less edges of the vertical slit. She tried to push it closed, but as soon as she let go it snapped open. “Why the hell was this necessary again?” she asked, pinching her third eye shut at the bridge of her nose.

He slowly sat up straight, his twisted eyebrows flattened in a glower. “Lydia. You let me take you to the Neitherworld. Twice.”

“Yeah…?”

“Now tell me somethin’. Didja know it would kill you? Still want to ‘get in’? Suicide via poltergeist?” he bit out. Suddenly he clutched at her shoulders, bringing her in nose to nose with her hand trapped between their foreheads. “The Neitherworld’s not just where dead schmucks hang around wailing and gnashing their teeth ‘cause they wanna. Dammit, it’s a fucking dimensional roach motel. Once ya check in, ya don’t check out again!” he shouted in her face. “Tell me you ain’t that fucking stupid, you didn’t just prance down there with no idea how to protect yourself, la dee da. What the hell were you thinkin'? !”

“I…I didn’t know,” Lydia breathed out, her chest brushing against his.

He wound his arms around her, crushing her closer. His eyes searched her face. “The first time, maybe. The second time, babes? You gonna tell me ya didn’t even guess what was goin’ on, while luring me Above with yer rack and take out?”

“I – there was no luring!”

“Ya little liar,” he hissed out through his teeth, burying his face in her neck. “You were cold. Dead cold.” A hand drifted down to trace her breast, warm and soft and alive. “Ya would’ve been dead if I…if ya weren’t…”

“If I weren’t what?” Lydia said slowly. _Not all human_ , his unspoken words echoed through her brain, a vision of what never was etched in her memory. If she couldn't feed on him, unknowingly, like some kind of energy vampire... What did being a natural mean? Where did her necromancy come from? It was in her blood, her grandmother had said. Her hand shook, holding the eye closed.

Mapping her body with his rough hands, he desperately searched for all the places he could feel her heartbeat. There it was under his cheek as he pressed his face in the hollow of her collarbone. It resonated in her joints, it reverberated in her ribs. The pounding rhythm was alien after centuries of silence in his own veins. He hadn’t even recognized it at first; a pulse sounded a lot different when it was absolutely terrified and jack-hammering through the neck of yokels he was scaring the skin off of.

“ _Why_?” he asked.

He sounded so honestly bewildered, just like he had the last time he questioned her self-destructive wishes in that dusty old attic four years ago. He sounded like he actually cared. He'd hurried past it then, pushed it away as unimportant. Now?

“Beej,” she murmured into his wild mane of blond hair, the scent of pond scum and smoke filling her nose. Iit wasn’t bad, per se…okay, the combination was awful, but she was getting used to it...used to _him_. “Beej, look at me.”

He let her lift his chin so she could peer in his eyes.

“I got better,” she said. “I guess I just didn’t think it was a big deal after all.”

Blinking, he said very reasonably, “You got better. You didn’t think it was a big deal.” Then he flung himself backwards on the bed and positively yowled, “AaaaOOUuuuU, LYDS! Lyds, why ya gotta do this to me, baby doll, devil-cake, honey bat – you’re gonna give me a heart attack even though it don’t even work in th’ first place! You’ll be the second death of me!”

“What is your major malfunction?” Lydia exclaimed, sitting on him to make him stop thrashing around before he knocked her off the bed and she fell ten feet to the floor. “Don't pin this all on me. You took me there, thinking I was a ghost. I mean, what the hell is up with that, huh? You can – I mean, poltergeists can usually turn themselves inside out and break the laws of gravity, but you don’t even have ghost-dar in there?” She rapped the knuckles of her free hand on his noggin.

“Hey, babes, why d'ya need a microscope to see germs?” he snarked, yanking on her arm so she lost her balance and sprawled over him, her naked thighs falling on either side of his hips. With the twitch of a thought, the bed sheet was gone and his hips were naked too. They could take a little break...

“You can’t be serious,” she said, wide-eyed.

“Ya looked like a ghost. Ya acted like a ghost. The energy that summoned me felt…deathy. For fuck's sake, who was it went around _wrestling_ with me all over the place?" He twisted his hips up into her and waggled his eyebrows. "I was _incorporeal_ and ya shoved me through the floor! D'ya think breathin' Joe Blow down the block can do that? I happen to be shit at reading auras because mine," he said while rubbing his growing erection between her thighs, "is massive."

He was difficult to fend off with two hands. With one tied up keeping her third eye closed, she didn’t have a chance.


	13. ) 14:

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hoo boy, I wrote this in a week, and I don't even know, it's probably terrible. Picking up a story after a long hiatus, not always a good idea.
> 
> Starts with the smexy, so if you're trying to avoid that part of the story skip ahead a bit!

PREVIOUSLY:

“You can’t be serious,” she said, wide-eyed.

“Ya looked like a ghost. Ya acted like a ghost. The energy that summoned me felt…deathy. For fuck's sake, who was it went around wrestling with me all over the place?" He twisted his hips up into her and waggled his eyebrows. "I was incorporeal and ya shoved me through the floor! D'ya think breathin' Joe Blow down the block can do that? I happen to be shit at reading auras because mine," he said while rubbing his growing erection between her thighs, "is massive."

He was difficult to fend off with two hands. With one tied up keeping her third eye closed, she didn’t have a chance.

AND NOW, ON WITH THE STORY!

Chapter Fourteen: 

A hand smoothed across the dimples of her back, and hands glided up her ribs to cup her breasts, and a hand kneaded her shoulder, and a hand adjusted the angle of her knee as Beetlejuice took full advantage of his freely given permission to "feel anything he wanted" about one Lydia Deetz.

Even as she thrust her nipples into his waiting fingers, even as her thighs clenched under his palms and ground her hot core against him, Lydia had that thinking-too-hard look. He loved that look. That look led to getting take-out, making out, and most recently, the highly-localized (i.e. Lydia-centric) return of most of his powers. Two seconds ago that look had almost led to her giving him permission to "turn himself inside out and break the laws of gravity"...

As her pouty lips parted, no doubt getting ready to argue some more, he twisted his thrusting and the head of his erection began to drag deliciously against her clit. With a full-body shudder, her head fell back and the arm holding her third eye shut jerked away. Her other hand clenched against his sternum, her fingers tangled in his musty chest hair.

Of course, the thing he loved best about that thinking-too-hard look was when he made it disappear -- her mouth slack with bliss instead of tense with words, her brown eyes blown dark with lust instead of a brow furrowed with thought. 

And now that third unblinking eye, black as midnight, an abyss staring back at him. _If_ he understood how it worked... With a salacious grin, he tried really hard _not_ to make up his mind about exactly how he wanted to pound her into the mattress. 

Lydia froze. Two eyes snapped shut and one widened, gleaming.

She saw his extra hands now, sparking energy tracing all over her body and swirling through her aura. She saw him jerk her hips up in the next moment and back down just right, impaling her suddenly sopping wet slit. She saw him decide to throw her face down and fuck her roughly from behind, her nails tearing at the sheets. She saw him yank her up to straddle his face while he ate her out with his strange striped tongue. She saw it from the front, from behind, below, above and _everywhere_ in between.

Her eye overwhelmed by the visions, she could still feel him beneath her, the ridged length of him sliding intimately, relentlessly against her.

About three seconds away from an intense climax, she saw something fifty times more effective than a cold shower in dousing her enthusiasm: Her parents were going to walk in on them!

"Oh my god! Beej!" She desperately scrabbled at his shoulder with one hand and slammed her third eye shut with the other. Augh! The look on her dad's face!

"Yeah, that's right--"

"NO, Beej, I forgot to lock the door last night, Delia has no concept of personal boundaries, my parents are HERE for some fucking reason--" Her incoherent distress surged into raw power sizzling on her tongue. "You Gotta Make Everything In This Room Look Normal For My Parents!"

His puzzled look melted into annoyance. With a heave and a rush of crackling static he rolled her over, and onto the plain cotton sheets of the loft bed.

Sheets that she'd never had time to put on it, because she'd never slept in it. She was staring at an unmarked, beige ceiling. There was an unfamiliar weight on her wrists, collarbone, and forehead. There was jangling metal under her fingertips. She let go and her third eye stayed closed.

His hips snapped against her in an extremely _familiar_ way that bounced her breasts. "Beej!" she exclaimed, looking down. Nonplussed, she blinked at the clean, slightly-stubbled blond coed with his wide hands on her hips, his pudge on display sans shirt, and his definitely thick dick wedged inside her still. "I said 'normal!'" she bit out.

"It's missionary! That's normal!" Only his voice was his own, cigarette-rough. He slammed his hands down on either side of her head and bore down. "And," he growled, "I locked. The. God-damn. Door!"

He thrust and she stuttered out, "O-oh!" And a little later, "OoooOOOOAah!" And when he kept thrusting against her unbearably stimulated flesh, seeking his own release, she spurred his hips into her with her ankles on his ass and leaned up to bite his earlobe. She commanded weakly, "Come...Right Now, before they get here!" But he did.

A peremptory knock came on the door a bare moment later. She called out, "Just a minute!" and scrambled down the ladder in nothing but the jewelry he'd juiced up, leaving him panting on the bed and muttering about what a cheater she was. 

"Lydia, let us in!" Delia thumped on the door again.

"Honey, it's your father and mother!" Charles Deetz helpfully, and loudly, added.

Groaning, Lydia grabbed at the clothes convincingly tossed on the floor. Bra on, now panties...where...? On the lamp. For a precious second she held up the only decent shirt in evidence, a black button down, before lobbing the obviously Beetlejuice-sized item at its owner. The jeans and white wife-beater followed suit, which left -- leather pants. As she hopped up and down trying to get them on, she found out that they were _tight_ leather pants. Oof, that did not feel good on her sore everything.

"Where's my shirt?" she hissed urgently at him, newly aware of how thin dorm walls actually are.  
He slowly sat up, pulling the clothes off his face. His expression twisted at the thought of having to actually _climb down_ , like some kind of mortal. "Babes," he said at his normal volume, "Seriously. How do ya expect me to get down? Gimme my powers back."

From outside came: "What's going on in there?!"

"I was asleep! I'm getting my face on! I tripped on a rug!" Lydia shouted back, and added in a whisper-shout as loud as she dared, "Just climb down and get dressed!" Randomly pulling open a drawer (that she had never had a chance to put clothes away in) and hoping, she found...scraps of lace that were pretending to be underwear. She hurriedly shut it.

"This isn't funny!" he exclaimed, shaking the blue jeans at her. "Normal this, normal that...I'm the ghost with the most!"

Then they yelled: "Do you have a BOY in there?!"

In the middle of opening the closet, she slammed it closed and rounded on him. Staring up at him, she quietly snarled, "No, it isn't funny! You're _refusing_ to use a five rung ladder?" She rubbed her tired eyes and dragged her palm down her face to thumb contemplatively at her mouth.

The ruckus outside increased.

Her tongue felt burnt, like she'd gulped too-hot coffee. Unsure if she could make an order stick, she was abruptly sick of the whole damn ridiculous argument. "Fine! Go ahead and float, you gigantic pain in my ass!"

"Finally!" he crowed, and was standing before her fully dressed in a chaotic blur of movement.  
With a nonplussed blink, she said, "I want to learn how to do that."

He smirked, the insane curl of his lip completely disturbing on such a normal face. "Mebbe later. Right now, don't we have visitors?" He turned her around by the shoulders to face the door and gave her a push.

About to open the door, she bleated, "Shirt!"

"Yer wearin' one, babes, c'mon, let's get this show on the road!"

She glanced down. She was. It was a thin black cold-shoulder t-shirt that clung to every curve. As he frog-marched her to the door while whistling a jaunty tune, she realized she had, once again, just got played. Clearly, getting it on had absolutely melted her brain.

"LY-DEE-A!" her step-mother howled, emphasizing each syllable of her name with a hinge-rattling knock. "Open this door IMMEDIATELY."

Beetlejuice flicked the latch, threw the door wide open, and said, "Come for your daughter, Chuck?" He grabbed the unprepared sap by the forearm and pumped his hand up and down in a salesman's shake. "Hi, how ya doin', call me B.J. It's so nice to finally formally introduce myself to my Lyds' father. I hope you'll give us your blessing. I would've asked you first and all, but y'know how it is, crazy young kids in love. Can I call you Dad? Aw, gimme a hug!" 

Quick as a wink, the hand was dropped and Beetlejuice smooshed himself against Charles, shoulder to shoulder and cheek to cheek, with one arm. Before the other arm could ensnare her step-mother, Lydia cut in and glued herself to Beej's other side.

As her father stood there staring fixedly into the distance in a kind of numb shock, Delia turned to Lydia and propped an elegantly gloved fist on a couture-clad hip. "Just WHO is this, dear?"

Plastering on a smile, Lydia said, "This is...uh..." She bit her lip. She realized that she had not come up with any contingency in her hare-brained scheme to finish her marriage that required her to explain any of it to her parents. Any of her parents. Or any of the hundreds of people that Grandma had filled out the guest list for their wedding with. 

She slid a look at Beej's new profile, clean if not clean-cut with its college-boy baby-fine stubble, and suddenly felt a pang of longing for the mold, the crooked line of his broken nose, the wickedly angled brows. Seeing him not give a damn about his crazy, filthy hair would be an inspiration right now. In less than a heartbeat, she made up her mind.

Lydia squared up and faced her step-mother. "Dad, Delia, this is Beetlejuice, my fiancé. You remember him, right?" She felt Beej go still against her, tightening his hold on her shoulder for a moment. "Four years ago...?" She tilted her head and gave Delia a pointed look. She couldn't even see her father, stuck on the other side of the hug as he was, but that might be for the best. This declaration seemed to have broken his stupor, and he started sputtering and struggling.

"You mean..." A perfectly drawn eyebrow arched, Delia's bright red lips in a slight moue, she studied the blonde frat brat crumpling Charles' suit and possessively clutching Lydia. The clothes, the age, the healthy glow, all of it was all wrong -- but there! That face, those cheekbones, the sensual turn of his mouth, his _eyes_. Glinting green with a hint of hazel that flickered gold as he returned stare for stare with attitude to spare. 

"No!" Delia declared breathlessly, "It can't be...MY MUSE!" She yanked him away from her family by the shoulders and shook him. 

"Whut," Beej said flatly, plucking her hands off of him and flicking them away.

"You HAVE to pose for my new line of sculptures!"

"He HAS to get away from my daughter and my wife!" Charles exploded, finding his voice.

"Dad!" Lydia exclaimed, pulling Beetlejuice out of range of her father's rather limp-wristed punches. Charles was circling his fists around for another go, trying to hop from one foot to another.

"Charles!" Delia shrilled, pulling him back. "What are you doing?! You'll put out your back!"

"I don't care!" He wagged a finger in Lydia's face, his blue eyes bulging. "Young lady, you get away from him this instant!"

"Dad, no!"

"As long as you live under my roof--"

"But I'm not!" Lydia interrupted. "You told me to go off to college, so I did! I'm an adult and I can make my own decisions!"

"And who's paying for this?" her father retorted.

"Well-!" Lydia's stomach chose that moment to growl loudly and protractedly. Gurgle-gurgle-glump. Her fierce glare dissolved into a sheepish pout. "Could we maybe eat before arguing?" she asked. "I haven't had anything since lunch yesterday."

Delia began drawing her husband back towards the stairs, saying soothingly, "Let's talk about this like civilized people over lunch, like we planned. We'll be waiting for you two downstairs! We're parked out front."

"Hrumph," he grumbled. Charles' suspicious eyes darted from Lydia to Beetlejuice as he stumbled backwards. "I'm onto your tricks! Both of you!" he shouted as his wife dragged him down the stairs and out of sight.

Upstairs, Lydia slumped back into Beej and rolled her eyes, rubbing her cranky stomach. "That could have gone worse," she sighed.

"Which part?" Beetlejuice asked snippily.

Meanwhile, heading down the stairs, Delia was also rolling her eyes as she told her husband, "Charles, you really don't understand young women, much less your daughter."

"What do you mean?"

"The more you tell her no, the more she'll like her...hmmm, ghost-man. She's at that age."

"You're probably right," he conceded.

"You know I am!" She booped his nose. "Cheer up. All we have to do is pretend we don't care and it's perfectly normal, and she'll lose interest."

He perked up. "You really think so?"

Privately, Delia had her doubts. You don't lose interest in eyes like that. "I know so," she sang out confidently, and glided down the steps.

Trudging down one step at a time, he shoved his hands in his pockets and glumly said, "I don't know if I can pretend it doesn't bother me!" Just imagining the pair of them being alone in Lydia's tiny dorm made his blood pressure spike.


End file.
